68 The Philip-pine Journal of Science wis 



entirely incapabte of detecting this fact — she enters the fig in 

 the same way, but there encounters only stigmas of another 

 type (fig. 1, C), not adapted to the reception of her eggs. She 

 vainly searches the interior of the fig, over and over, involun- 

 tarily distributing to the normal stigmas the pollen with which 

 her body was thoroughly dusted, until thwarted and exhausted, 

 she finally dies. From one to a dozen or more dead bodies of 

 females sacrificed to this service may be found in each young 

 fertile fig. More or less rapid disintegration of the dead bodies 

 of these females takes place in the liquor which commonly accu- 

 mulates in the interior of the developing fig.^ 



None of the guests nor parasites of F. nota enters the fig by the 

 ostiole for oviposition as does the blastophaga. They all possess 

 ovipositors of extraordinary length with which the entire wall 

 of the receptacle is pierced. Whether the eggs of the guests 

 and parasites are inserted in the ovaries directly, or whether^ 

 they hatch outside of the ovary and find their way through the 

 style, is as yet unknown; indeed, the entire question of their 

 specific relations to the blastophaga is an open one. That their 

 larvae must commonly develop in ovaries already occupied by 

 blastophaga seems certain, and as the two cannot live in one 

 and the same ovary, and as the guests and parasites certainly 

 eventually occupy ovaries in enormous numbers, they must surely 

 interfere seriously with the blastophaga; although whether as 



' The presence of a liquor in the developing fig is a matter apart and 

 a very interesting one — seemingly a question for the plant physiologist. 

 The presence of liquor in the earlier stages would prevent the successful 

 entrance of the female blastophaga. I have not seen much liquor in figs at 

 the receptive age. Later there seems to be some connection between its 

 formation and the occurrence of very heavy rains, at which times the figs 

 may become fairly turgid with it. Mr. A. D. E. Elmer tells me that 

 at times certain species of figs in the Islands produce this liquor in such 

 quantities that it drips from them to the extent of forming pools on the 

 ground beneath. 



Cunningham mentions observing infusorians and "filariae" in this liquor. 

 These and bacteria would be expected under the circumstances. I was, 

 however, especially interested in his mention of "filariae." Many years ago 

 when I first went to Cuba as agricultural botanist to the Estacion Central 

 Agronomica, I at once began observations on the local fig insects. In one 

 species the females frequently had the abdomen enormously swollen, and 

 this I found packed with nematodes. Wheeler [Am. Nat. (1901), 35, 

 877] has published accounts of a similar "mermithergatism" in ants, due 

 to the presence of Mermis. In one of the first figs of F. nota which I 

 opened in these Islands, I found a female fig insect with abdomen distended 

 by worms; and in the liquor of certain figs "filariae" were common, al- 

 though whether the same as the parasitic form or not is unknown. Here 

 is a most interesting problem for the helminthologist. 



Mi 



