122 MANDIBULATA. — HYMEKOPTEllA. 



palpi filiform, maxillary usually .5-jointed : mandibles bidentate;, or notched: 

 anterior wings with the first submarginal areolet very large, the 2 discoidal 

 ones situated longitudinally one above the other, the outer one as broad at 

 its base as the apex of the external humeral one : ovipositor either concealed, 

 or more or less esserted, often above twice the length of the insect, slender, 

 setaceous. Larvae elongate, fleshy, subsisting upon the fatty portions of other 

 living larvffi — chiefly of the Lepidoptera — in which they freqviently change 

 to pupa, these last are sometimes enveloped in a tough glossy silken cocoon, 

 or in one of an open texture. 



The insects contained in this very extensive and difficult family 

 appear destined to keep within due bounds the larvae of other 

 insects, especially those of the Lepidoptera, upon which they subsist 



would therefore be presumptuous in me to venture upon breaking up the labours 

 of Gravenhorst, &c. without the probability of improving them ; but, so far as 

 the mere ascertainment of the indigenous species allows, I conceive the object 

 of my investigations will be fully answered in these pages, as I have been 

 unremitting in my endeavours to detect as many as possible, though, from the 

 immense extent of, and great difficulty attendant upon many parts of, the 

 subject, I cannot expect to make other than an approximation to the truth. 

 With regard to another matter, I must again refer to the Introduction to my 1st 

 vol., wherein it is observed "that I have endeavoured to steer the middle course, 

 and to give such distinctive characters as will apparently separate from its 

 affinities any particular insect that has come under my observation," "as 

 minute descriptions are the province of the monographer alone, and are ill 

 calculated for a work of this nature ;" and shall merely remark, with reference 

 to the additional observations in the Entomological Magazine, vol. iii. p. 170, 

 to which, or other criticisms, I have doubtless a right to reply — that although 

 / never attempted to compare my labours with those of Kirby and Gyllenhal, 

 therein referred to, it may be stated that the descriptions of the latter author 

 occupy upon an average above a page each — viz. 2,190 species in 2,630 

 pages — and those of the former, with their accompanying notes, from 

 1 to 12 pages — 2i0 species in 377 pages, and a volume upon the sections; 

 • — hence the length of time alluded to by me in the postscript to my 

 5th volume, as required for the completion of this work upon a similar 

 plan (exclusively of the additional expense): and although in that post- 

 script I alluded to the fact of Mr. Shuckard's inability to ascertain certain 

 species of Andrena, &c. by means of the " Monographia Apum Anglise," a 

 position corrected by me in my vol. vi. p. 19, it may be added, that those insects 

 are of a peculiar habit, and speedily alter by age during life, and hence the 

 same species assumes so many phases, that it hecomes almost impossible, from 

 the description of a single example of a long-excluded individual, however 

 accurate — and the accuracy of Mr. Kirby " is beyond all praise," — to give a 

 definition that shall correspond with a recently disclosed one, a cause that does 



