582 MATERNAL SOLICITUDE IN INSECTS. 



questioned, and one of these (Parfitt) was by his own account ig-norant 

 of any literature on the subject. So that Fabre's gibe at messieurs 

 the compilers has failed to score. Boitard's account may perhaps be 

 treated a little incredulously, and possibly also Modeer's interpretation 

 of the paternal gymnastics. In my opinion, at least, it will be neces- 

 sary^ to have much more direct refutation of De Geer, Hellins, and 

 Partitt than the observations of even Fabre on species of another 

 subfamily. 



With reg'ard to Fabre's asseveration that he never once found a 

 female "Pentatoma"''' stationar}^ near the eggs, this is circumstan- 

 tially contradicted by the precise observations of Hellins and Pariitt in 

 Elasmostethus. Neither has the French author proved his theory, 

 upon which he establishes so large a part of his assumptions, that the 

 Pentatomida^ (or at least some of them) oviposit in more than one 

 place. It is to be regretted that he did not examine the oviducts of 

 one of the females observed by him. Moreover, it does not appear 

 that Fabre marked any of the female Pentatomina" o})served by him 

 so as to recognize them in the event of any "chance" returns to the 

 original spot. Fabre also says, "A Pentatoma smaller than the graj^ 

 bug has given me in a single batch more than 100 eggs," and insists 

 therefore that De Geer's record of 20 in the gray bug could have 

 been only a partial laying! 



This confines the subject entirely to the Rhynchota; now we have 

 also, as noted above at the beginning of this paper, records of the 

 devotion of the mother earwig (and of more species than one), records 

 as well authenticated as such could well be, not only in written litera- 

 ture, but from living observers who have not considered it worth 

 while to register what has always appeared as a thoroughly firmly 

 founded fact. The occurrence in GryUotaJpa (iryUotaljxi seems also 

 authentic, while the recent confirmation by Froggatt, after seventy 

 years' interval, of Lewis's observations on Perga levnsU establishes 

 this remarkable case beyond doubt, and it is especially interesting to 

 note that in other Australian species of the same genus entirely difl'er- 

 ent larval habits are known to obtain; the latter is another argument 

 against Fabre. What is there of incredilnlity in the whole recital 'I 

 What a limited demonstration of afl^ection, or at least of intelligent 

 power, compared with that displayed by the social H^nnenoptera and 

 Neuroptera! Fabre argues as if parental solicitude and the sense of 

 direction were unknown among the insecta, and his sneer at the inad- 

 equacy of the memory of the mother bug" to rediscover the original 

 place of oviposition is remarkable enough from the historian of the 

 habits of the Hymenoptera. 



To conclude, Fabre may prove to be right, and Goedaert, Frisch, 

 Modeer, De Geer, Kirby and Spence, Rennie, Montrouzier, Boitard, 

 Lew4s, Parfitt, Hellins, Camerano, Froggatt, and Bingham, all, to a 



