176 
hymenoptera. 
Connected with these fig insects are parasites, insects very closely 
allied and which lay their eggs in the larvae of the fig insects in the 
fig gall flowers ; Cunningham does not appear to have been aware of 
this fact or to have known what fig insects he was dealing with and 
this is to be regretted as his conclusions may require to be vitally 
modified. (This applies equally to the same author’s chapter in that 
popular but inaccurate work ‘ Pains and Pleasures of Life in Bengal.’) 
Fig insects seem to be very abundant in India, and a great number 
of the wild figs produce large crops of them. The question has a special 
interest in view of the fact that the true fig is stated to produce the 
best figs only when its fig insect Blastophaga p senes, Low., is present; 
for this purpose a wild fig has to be cultivated with the cultivated fig to 
yield Blastophaga ; so necessary is this considered that the wild fig 
(Capri fig) has been introduced to California and South Africa with the 
Blastophaga, in order to give the figs there grown the proper conditions 
for full development, though entomologists 
are not yet agreed as to the part played 
by the insect. 
That the fruits of our common fig trees 
(the pipal, banyan, pakur, gular, &c.) are 
constantly infested with fig insects can be 
readily ascertained by examination, various 
caterpillars, weevils, flies, &c., also occurring 
in them, but the respective parts played 
by these insects, their mode of life and 
their relations to the tree are practically 
unknown and offer a very fertile field for 
inquiry. We figure from Westwood some 
of the insects obtained from figs in India ; 
the problem is one of great complexity and 
interest, attention has been drawn to it more than once in the 
Indian press from the economic aspect since large quantities of 
fruit are constantly “ destroyed ” by these insects, but it is doubt¬ 
ful if any means can be devised of checking them and were it done, 
it is uncertain what would be the effect upon the production of fruit. 
Podagnon minutum, Ashm., was reared from the egg mass of a man¬ 
tis, the female with a long ovipositor many times her own length for lay- 
Fi< 
91—Walkerflla temer- 
ARIA. 
(From Westwood.) 
