Notes on Some Parasites of Sugar Cane Insects etc. 



273 



(i. e. the Mantoidea, Phasrnoidea and Phylloidea). The Mantieformia 

 approach very closely to the Neuroptera in some respects, and I am 

 by no means certain that the Mantieformia do not represent an inter- 

 mediate stage between the Neuroptera and the Platyptera. 



While I would not insist iipon a Platyptero-Mantieformia (or an 

 Embioideo-Mantiformia) line of descent, it is nevertheless true that the 

 Embioidea present many points of similarity to the Mantieformia^ and 

 are undoiibtedly the more priiiiitively organized of the two. It is not 

 claimed, however, that the Mantieformia are the descendents of the 

 Embioidea, but merely that the Embioidea have departed but little 

 from the aucestral forms common to the to two groups — at least so far 

 as their general structure is concerned. On this account, the fact that 

 no Embioidea have been found earlier than the Tertiary period, while 

 the Mantieformia are geologically much older, has no particular weight. 

 Since the preservation of fossil remains is wholly a matter of chance, 

 it is small wonder that the geological record ol" the ancestry of such 

 rare insects as the Embioidea is very incomplele, and this would in 

 all probability account for the fact that we knov.- of no fossil ancestral 

 forms counecting them with the Mantieformia. The Blattieformia 

 (Blatt(»idea and Isoptera) are very closely related to the Mantieformia, 

 and doubtleüs branched off very near the origin of the Mantieformia 

 line. It must ce admitted, however, that until we have at our disposal 

 more information concerning the anatomical details of a large number 

 of intermediate forms (wheter living or fossil), the discussion of the 

 lines of descent leading from the lower pterygote forms must be regarded 

 as too highly speculative, to be of any great practical value. 



By way of summary, the principal points brought out in the 

 present paper may be briefly stated as followes. The marked simi- 

 larity of structure between insects of the apterygote order Myrientomata 

 and the pterygote order Platyptera* would indicate that there has been 

 a Myrieuto- Platyptera line of descent leading from the ancestors of 

 the Apterygota to those of the Pterygota. Similary, there are indi- 

 cations of a Dicelluro-Dermaptera and a Dicelluro-Coleoptera line of 

 descent from ancestors resembling the Japygidae to the ancestors of 

 the Dermapiera and Coleoptera. To these may be added a Thysanuro- 

 Ephemeroidea line from the ancestors of the Thysanura to those of the 

 mayflies. These, and other lines which will doubtless be added to them, 

 would indicate that the Pterygota are in a sence a ^polyphyletic" 

 group, derived, not through one line, but through several lines of descent. 



Notes on some parasites of siigar cane insects In Java 

 with descriptions of new-Hymenoptera ChaJcldoidea.'') 

 By A. A. Girault) Nelson (Cairus), N. Queensland. Australia. 



Herr P. van der Goot, Entomologist of the Experiment Station 

 of the Java Sugarcane Industry at Pasoeroean, Java, was kiud enough 

 tosend to me für Identification a number of egg-parasites of sugarcane 

 insects upon part of which I report in the following pages. 



*) Contribution No. 9, Entomological Laboratory, Bureau of Sugar Experi- 

 ment Stations, Bundaberg, Queensland. 



ü -gf-n XVIII dfir „Zeitschr. f. wies. Ins -Biologie", Druck vom <0. November 1915. 



