34 



THE AMERICAN ENTOMOLOGIST. 



female fly. The particular species of Lacewing 

 fly that preys in this savage manner upon the 

 Curculio larva I vs^as not able to ascertain, as I 

 failed to breed the larva to maturity. But there 

 is such a strong general resemblance between all 

 the different species of this genus, both in the 

 larva and in the perfect state, that scarcely any 

 one but a professional entomologist could dis- 

 tingTiish one from another when placed side by 

 side. All the Lacewing flies, it may be remarked 

 here, are cannibals, and they prey upon a great 

 variety of noxious insects, including both Plant- 

 lice and Bark-lice. 



But wonders will never cease. It has Mtherto 

 been currently supposed that no insect, whether 

 cannibal or j)arasite, pi-eys upon the Curculio ; 

 and, so far as regards the parasites, I believe 

 that this theory is correct. But now I discover 

 a second species, and this time not a Neuropter- 

 ous insect like the Lacewing fly, but a true 

 Beetle (order of Coleoptera), which has appa- 

 rently been engaged in the same good work as 

 Ms remotely-allied cousin. Inside a peach, wliich 

 has been completely excavated by Curculio 

 larvse, friend Holcomb shows me the rare little 

 Ground-beetle (Carabus family) figured in the 

 [Fig. 28.] margin (Aspidoglossa subangu- 



lata, Chaiid., Fig. 26) . What is 

 he doing there? Clearly he has 

 no taste for vegetable food, for 

 all the North Ameiican species 

 of the very extensive family to 

 which he belongs are, so far as 

 is known, cannibals. In all pro- 

 bability he has been eating up 

 the mischievous grubs that had 

 honeycombed this peach 1 At 

 all events, he is to be strongly suspected of so do- 

 ing. To adopt Shakspeare's mode of reasoning : 



' 'Who finds the heifer dead, and bleeding fresh, 

 And sees fast by a butcher with an axe, 

 But will suspect 'twas he that made the slaughter?' ' 



So far we have discovered two distinct insects 

 depredating upon the Curculio larvse above 

 ground, and while it is still inside the fruit which 

 it attacks. Perhaps, when it has left the fruit 

 and gone underground, it is safe from its can- 

 nibal foes. No such thing! Friend Leming, 

 after digging with a hoe for some time among 

 the loose earth under a peach tree, finds at length 

 for me a certain larva, which he has long ob- 

 sei-ved to prey upon the Curculio lai-vae under- 

 ground. It is now comparatively rare, as he 

 infoi-ms me, but in the spring he had found 

 thousands of them in the earth under his peach 

 trees, and had tried in vain to breed them to the 



Color — Shiny black. 



perfect state. For, although they seemed to 

 relish Curculio lai-vse that he had dug up under- 

 ground, yet he could not, he says, get them to 

 feed freely upon such as he took out of the firuit. 

 Annexed will be found a correct sketch of this 



CFig- 260 



Colors— Brown and whitish. 



insect (Fig. 26 j4) . B represents the under side 

 of the head, showing at c the upper jaw (man- 

 dible), at g the lower jaw (maxil), with its 

 four-jointed feelers (palpi), at/ the lower lip 

 (labium), with its two-jointed feelers (palpi), 

 and at e the antenna* 



. Clearly this is the larva of some Gi'ound-beetle. 

 But of what particular species? That can only 

 be satisfactorily proved by breeding the larva to 

 the perfect beetle state, which I hope to do, al- 

 though all these cannibal larvae are more or less 

 hard to breed. In the meantime, while Mr. 

 Leming has been digging under his peach trees, 

 I have discovered among the loose earth four dif- 

 ferent kinds of Ground-beetles, two of which are 



[Fig. 27.] [FiK. S8.] 



C oloiB— D'lll black and brown. 



Color— Shiny black. 



represented in Figures 27 and 28, and to any one 

 of which four my lanra may possibly belong. 



•Here follows the "technical description of this larra, 

 taken trom the living insect: Shining bro^vn-black and 

 horny above; thorax immaculate above j sutures and sides 

 of the abdominal dorsum, and all beneath, except the head, 

 pale dull greenish white; a narrow, horny, elongate, abbre- 

 viated lateral dark stripe on the dorsum of each of the ab- 

 dominal joints (4^—12); joints 4 — 10 beneath, each with seven 

 pale-brown horny spots, namely a large subquadrate spot 

 luUowed by two small dots in the middle, an elongate spot 

 on each side, and between that and the two medial small 

 dots a second elongate spot, only half the length and breadth 

 of the lateral one (Fig. 26, j); joint 11 bcneafh has only the 

 medial subtiuadrate spot and the lateral elongaf o one (Fig. 26, 

 i) ; and joint 12 beneath has nothing but the subquadrate spot 

 (Fig. 26, ft); legs six, of a pale rafous color; the usual 

 elongate oarabidous proleg on joint 12, and on each side of 

 its tip an elongate exarticulate cercus, garnished with a few 

 hairs; antermre four-jointed; labial palpi two-jointed; 

 maxillary palpi foui'-jointed. Length 1.25 inch. 



