ICHNEUMON. 
49 s 
in that pofhion ; for the young animals produced fron* 
them eatily make their way into the body of the cater- 
pillar on which they were placed. 
Various are the fizes of this carnivorous race : Some 
are fo fmall, that the plant loufe, the curculio, or the fpi- 
der’s egg, is made the cradle for their young ; and all 
the infedts upon which they fix undergo the fame fatal 
deftiny, fooner or later perilhing by their depredations. 
Thofe carcafes of plant lice which are feen motionlefs oti 
the rofe-tree leaf, have been each the habitation of a fmall 
larva, which, after having devoured the intrails of the 
plant loufe, has performed its metamorphofis under the 
empty (kin, from which it has afterwards fallied forth a 
winged ichneumon. 
But though many of thefe infedts are fo extremely mi- 
nute, there are others, which, from their fize and intre- 
pidity, are formidable to the fpider. Many of thefe chal- 
lenge that animal to open combat, and having run him 
through with their flings, tear him to pieces ; thus a- 
venging the whole race of Hies of the injuries they fuffer 
from that mod dreaded enemy of their kind. 
Ichneumon aphidum. This infect is almoft wholly 
black ; the abdomen, towards the bafe, and the feet, are 
yellow ; the antennae are black. This fpecies, when 
about to depofit its eggs, bends the abdomen till the 
anus nearly approaches the thorax, and thus penetrates 
into the anus ot the plant loufe, in which it lodges its pro- 
geny f. 
The paralitic ichneumon %, The larva of this infedl: 
adheres to the body of a caterpillar, upon which it feeds. 
Thu 
f Regne Animale, Ord. V. Gen. iii. fpec. g, 
| Vide Adtes d’Upfal, 1736, p. 29, N. II, 
