The Entomologist Volume 41 (Paperback)

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1908 Excerpt: ...one-sixth; an egg 18 mm. across is 15 in. high. The eggshells are whitish and slightly rough, with no special structure; this is, however, probably due to the cement smeared over them. When damp they are transparent, and the larva inside, when alive and filling the shell, was no doubt quite visible inside it, coiled up. The egg is a very large one, the diameter being 1'8 to 1-9 mm. In a mounted portion of the shell the micropyle is a little patch of very small cells, with centrally eight black dots (pores). The blackness of the dots is merely a refractive effect, as the focus can be altered so as to make them brilliant points. In the immediate neighbourhood of the dots the cells are approximately hexagonal and 0-01 mm. in diameter; at O'l from the centre they are about 0'015; at 015 they are radially elongated, about 0"015 across and 0"03 long; at '25 from the centre they are about 004 long. One or two can be barely made out at 0.3 mm. from centre, about O'OS mm. wide and 0"06 long; beyond this no traces of cellular structure can be seen. The shell generally is finely granular. The appearance conveys to me--I cannot quite say how--a suspicion that these granules belong to an adventitious coat (of cement?), but this can hardly be the case regarding their very uniform size and general distribution; each granule occupies a space of about 00025 mm. across. The result of certain scratchings and scrapings of another portion of egg-shell leads me to conclude that these granules are adventitious, but not from misplaced cement; possibly they are some portion of embryonic membrane, as they appear to be rather on the inner surface of the shell. P. homeru8 larva at hatching is 5'0 mm. long, head 12 mm. wide; head dark brown, dorsum fuscous-brown to seven...