708 FIFTH KEPOKT OF THE ENTOMOLOGICAL COMMISSION. 
bodies are beanled serve as a brush to sweep this dust into these lateral 
openings. Tims the months of these notches become filled and the eggs 
therein covered and concealed from any predaceons insect which may 
enter the burrow alter the parent has completed her work and before 
the egg8 have hatched and the young have mined their way beyond 
the reach ofsnch enemies. The female continues her operations until 
her Stock of eggs is exhausted, forming a burrow from 4 to 8 inch< 
more in length. 
" The eggs of this beetle are about 0.025 long, of a broad, oval shape, 
and a watery white color. They may be met with in their newly formed 
burrows beneath the bark the forepart of June. They probably hatch 
in ten to twenty days, according to the temperature of the atmosphere 
at this time. The infantile larva is invariably found lying with its back 
towards the sawdust with which the notch in which it is bred is tilled, 
its mouth being thus brought in contact with the soft innermost layer 
of the bark at the extremity of the notch — the elastic nature of the saw- 
dust probably aiding iu pressing its mouth against its destined nourish- 
ment. Thus it has only to part its jaws and close them together again 
to fill its mouth with food. And by repetitions of this motion a cavity 
is gradually formed between the bark and the wood, into which its head 
sinks, and afterwards its body. This cavity consequently takes a direc- 
tion outwards at right angles with the central burrow. And thus the 
larva eats its way onward until it has obtained its growth, forming 
hereby a gallery varyiug in its length from about 1 to 3 inches, 
as the material consumed has been of a quality more or less nutritious, 
and winding and turning where impediments have been encountered or 
the track of another larva has been approached. Many of these lateral 
galleries, however, end abruptly before they are half completed, the 
worm having been destroyed by insect enemies or some other casualty. 
And it is curious to notice how these little creatures respect the terri- 
tory which is already iu possession of another, changing their course to 
avoid any encroachment thereon; aud if one of them rinds himself so 
surrounded and hemmed in by other tracks that it becomes impossible 
for him to refrain from encountering them, he so shapes his course as 
to cross his neighbor's road as nearly as possible at right angles instead 
of obliquely, thus intruding thereou as little aud for as short a time as 
possible. Sometimes also two females happen to excavate their galle- 
ries parallel with each other, aud so near that no adequate space remains 
between them for their young to mine their burrows, the beetles having 
been unaware of their proximity, no doubt, until too much labor had 
been expended to admit either one to abandon the ground and go else 
where. In such cases the eggs are all placed along the outer side of 
each gallery, and thus the Larva all miue their way outward in opposite 
directions to each other. 
The larva is a plump soft white worm, broadest anteriorly, aud with 
its body bent iuto an arch or having its tail turned partially inward 
