MATERNAL SOLICITUDE IN RHYNCHOTA, 115 



birch bug is included). His remarks have been recently trans- 

 lated in ' The Entomologist ' [15] . Montrouzier appears to have 

 been unaware of the researches of Modeer and DeGeer. Douglas 

 and Scott [20] quote a letter addressed to the former by E. 

 Parfitt, enclosing an adult female and young ones identified as 

 " Acanthosoma c/risemn." This letter circumstantially verifies 

 DeGeer's observations, which, so Parfitt states, were unknown to 

 the English entomologist. These habits were still further con- 

 firmed in great detail, in three notices [10, 11, and 12], by 

 Hellins, a well-known and most careful observer. 



Last year I contributed to ' The Entomologist ' [15] a transla- 

 tion of IMontrouzier's observations [19], and noted "a species of 

 Spudaus (?) " sent by Dr. Willey from Birara (New Britain), of 

 which I had under my care for study alcoholic specimens appa- 

 rently confirming the generally accepted opinion. These speci- 

 mens belong to the Pentatomine Coctoteris exiguus, Distant, a 

 determination kindly confirmed for me by the author of the 

 specific name. 



So far the five original observers, viz. IVIodeer, De Geer, 

 IVIontrouzier, Parfitt, and Hellins, agree that the female bug 

 does show parental affection during a comparatively consider- 

 able period, and the first-named declares that this is, in part 

 at least, directed against the assaults of the male ; but in 1901 

 J. H. Fabre, the " immortal Fabre" of Darwin, and one of the 

 foremost of modern field observers, has published a lengthy 

 document [5] , in which he declares DeGeer* to be mistaken. The 

 gist of Fabre's paper is as follows : The grey bugt is rare in Fabre's 

 neighbourhood; he found three or four specimens which he placed 

 under a bell-jar, but they did not oviposit, though eggs were laid 

 by the green [= Palomena pi'asinus (Linne)] , red- and black- 

 speckled [= Euri/dema orjiatus (Linne) j, and yellowish [sp. ?] | ; 

 and Fabre continues, "In species so closely allied, parental care in 

 one ought, at least in some details, to be discovered also in the 

 others." It cannot be too strongly expressed that the last three 

 are not at all closely related to the grey bug, for the last-named 

 belongs to the Acanthosomatinae, the other three to the Penta- 

 tominse, subfamilies distinguished apart by considerable and im- 

 portant structural differences. Fabre declares that in these 

 species " the mother paid no attention to her brood ; the last egg 

 laid in its place at the extreme end of the final row, she left, 

 careless of the trust ; she no longer busied herself with it, and 

 returned no more. If the chances of roaming bring her back, 

 she walks over the heap and passes on indifferent. . . . This 



■'■ The Swedish master and Boitard are the only authors mentioned by 

 Fabre, and he appears to be unaware of the independent observations of 

 Montrouzier, Parfitt, and HeUins. 



f Elasmostethus griseus (Linne) = Acanthosoma interstinchivi oi Saun- 

 ders's ' Hemiptera Heteroptera of the British Isles.' 



J Fabre calls these all " Pentatoma." 



