Wasps, Bees, and Ants 
485 
that of the male is not more than \ inch. The males, only about inch 
long, are much more rarely seen than the females. 
Among the smaller parasitic Hymenoptera, 
the Chalcidids, Braconids, and Proctotrypids, but 
few complete life-histories are known. Many 
of the Proctotrypids, an enormous family in 
number of species, live, all but the winged adult 
stage of their life, in the eggs of other insects, 
Fig. 684. 
Fig. 683.— Pelecinus polyturator, female. (Natural size.) 
Fig. 684.— Pelecinus polyturator (?), male (Three and one-half times natural size.) 
a half-dozen individuals perhaps in a single egg; needless to say they are 
among our smallest insects. Some are wingless, some show a marvelous hyper- 
Fig. 685. — Meteorus hyphantrice , parasite of the green-fruit worms, Xylina sp. 
(After Slingerland; much enlarged.) 
metamorphosis in their life-history, and all present extremely interesting prob¬ 
lems to biological students. Howard gives in his Insect Book an account 
of the life-history, as worked out by Schwarz, of a chalcis-fly, Euplectrus 
