2166 Insects. 



excrescences. Suspecting these to be galls I enclosed them in a box ; and upon 

 examining them, at the close of the next spring, I found they had produced two dipterous 

 insects — a species of Phytomyza — and a large number of a chalciditous insect, which 

 had been parasitical on the rightful inmate. Mr. Walker states it to be Callimome 

 posticus. This was in the vicinity of Newcastle. On the 1 5th September, 1847, I 

 found an abundance of a large, reddish, irregular shaped, fleshy gall, nearly as con- 

 spicuous as the bedeguar on the briar produced by Rhodites Rosa?, at the roots of the 

 same plant, in marshy places on the sea-banks, near Redheugh, Berwickshire. Like 

 that of the briar it was a social production, and was peopled by a community of small 

 grubs. I have not succeeded in rearing the perfect insect. — Id. 



Gall of the Tansy, with a Description of the Fly by which it is occasioned. — On the 

 29th of August, 1846, I found the flowers of the tansy (Tanacetum vulgare), near Der- 

 wenthaugh, county of Durham, disfigured by a large dark green protuberant gall, 

 rising from the middle of the flower ; at the base of this I found a white larva, with a 

 slight pink tinge, from which I bred, shortly after, a considerable number of a species 

 of Cecidomyia, which comes nearest to the C. bicolor of Meigen. The following are 

 the characters of the insect. 



Female (alive). Antennae rather long, fuscous, the joints with pale bases and tips : 

 head and thorax black, sides of the latter purplish : abdomen purplish, dusky at the 

 tip, a duskier band across each segment, bearing rows of whitish bristly hairs, most 

 distinctly seen at the sides ; beneath, with a row of dusky bristle-bearing points along 

 the centre ; ovipositor long, about a third of the body, approaching to bulbous at the 

 root and narrowed to a point, very flexible, flesh-coloured, slightly fuscous on the top, 

 the point pale : legs long, slender, and with the halteres pale testaceous : wings with 

 a dark tinge, slightly yellowish at the base, — the red pulp of the body running up and 

 colouring the nervures, of which only two are distinctly marked, — finely fringed. 

 Length f — 1 line. 



Female (dead). Antennae dusky : head and thorax black : abdomen dull flesh co- 

 lour : legs and halteres dirty white : wings darkened. 



Male (alive). Antennae black : eyes black : front, and the breast before the ante- 

 rior legs, pale pink coloured : abdomen narrower, dusky, pale at the tip, a row of im- 

 pressions on each side above, somewhat hairy, the apex furnished with two hooks. 

 Smaller than the female. — Id. 



Parasite of Aleyrodes Chelidonii. — In the autumn of 1846, I found, in the woods 

 near Gibside, the underside of the leaves of the common honeysuckle (Lonicera Peri- 

 clymenum) abounding with the scale-like larvae and pupae of Aleyrodes Chelidonii, at- 

 tached close to the cuticle. Having brought some home, for the purpose of breeding 

 perfect specimens, I found that, besides producing Aleyrodes, considerable numbers of 

 a minute hymenopterous insect had issued from within. Some of them were still ad- 

 hering to the scales, of which those that had been infested with it were distinguishable 

 by a black speck on their surface. The parasite, Mr. Walker informs me, is Myina 

 Chaonia. — Id. 



