1909. | ECTOPARASITES OF THE RED GROUSE. 319 
The Eggs. 
The eggs are very beautiful objects ; in badly infested grouse 
they may be numerous, but as a rule they were none too easy to 
find. Usually they occur in small groups attached to the base of 
the after-plume and between it and the shaft of the plume. 
The specimen figured was on one of the feathers from the 
flank. 
The eggs are elongated, some three to four times as long as they 
are broad. ‘They are fixed by some adhesive secretion at the end 
corresponding to the posterior end of the contained embryo. At 
the other end is a well-marked cap or operculum which always 
points to the free end of the feather. The beauty of the re- 
ticulated egg-case is shown best in the genus WMenopon, and we 
figure one, which we take to be the egg of Menopon pallescens 
Nitzsch, found on the feathers of a partridge. Under the pressure 
of a cover-slip the egg-case gradually ruptured along a circular 
line below the well-marked thickened edge or rim of the 
operculum. ‘The contained egg then began to emerge, carrying 
the operculum as a sort of cap, the resemblance to which was 
emphasised by the long process which stands out like a feather 
borne on the apex. The eggs of Goniodes show the reticulations 
less well, but they are well marked on the operculum, which bears 
a long tapering filament, longer than the egg itself. They also 
occur just below the opercular rim, but fade away towards the 
fixed end. The general appearance of the eggs in the after-plume 
is shown in P]. XL. fig. 15. They were found on the 27th July, 
1908, and they seem to be laid throughout the summer. 
There is no metamorphosis, the young leaving the egg-shell as 
a miniature of their parents. 
Il.—Wyruus CAMERATUS Nitzsch. 
This insect seems to have been first named by Nitzsch * in the 
year 1818, but with no description. Indeed, the animal is men- 
tioned under the subgenus WVirmus, but is called Philopterus 
cameratus. It is figured and described, and a bibliography is 
given, in Denny’s ‘ Monographia Anoplurorum Britanniz’ 7 under 
the name of Mirmus cameratus. Denny found it on the Red 
Grouse, the Black Grouse, ‘“‘ and I expect also on the Ptarmigan.” 
Grube describes it in Middendorft’s ‘ Siberian Travels’ as existing 
on Lagopus albus and L. alpinus, thus confirming Denny’s 
surmise. 
It is mentioned in Giebel’s articlet on the Halle Bird-lice, 
and described and figured in his great monograph ‘ Insecta 
* Germar’s ‘ Magazin der Entomologie,’ Halle, iii. 1818, p. 291. 
+ London, 1842, p. 112. 
t Zeitschr. ges. Naturwiss. xxviil. 1866, p. 370. 
