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Of all the batches of eggs collected, one alone hatched. The rest were probably sterile, a suspicion corroborated by the lack of pairing in the breeding-cage. Laid at the end of July, the eggs of the Twelve-spotted Mylabris began to hatch on the 5th of September. The primary larva of this Meloid is still unknown, so far as I am aware; and I shall describe it in detail.
By eliminating what was known to me and seeking among the Meloidæ of my neighbourhood for the size that corresponded with the pseudochrysalids unearthed from the Tachytes' burrows, I found, as I have said, only Schaeffer's Cerocoma and the Twelve-spotted Mylabris. I undertook to rear these in order to obtain their eggs.
We no longer have to do with the puny louse of the Oil-beetle, which lies in ambush on a cichoriaceous blossom in order to slip into the fleece of a harvesting Bee; nor with the black atom of the Sitaris, which swarms in a heap on the spot where it is hatched, at the Anthophora's door. I see the young Mylabris striding eagerly up and down the glass tube in which it was born. What is it seeking?
This last date is best-suited to explain the presence of the parasitic larva and its pseudochrysalis in the Tachytes' burrows from July onwards. Moreover, the Cerocoma is very abundant in the neighbourhood of the sand-heaps haunted by the Tachytes, while the Mylabris does not occur there.
The only Melodiæ in my part of the country which, though their habits are still unknown, might correspond in size with either the larva or the pseudochrysalis in question are the Twelve-pointed Mylabris and Schaeffer's Cerocoma. I find the first in July on the flowers of the sea scabious; I find the second at the end of May and in June on the heads of the Îles d'Hyères everlasting.
The Twelve-spotted Mylabris and the Four-spotted Mylabris present differences quite as pronounced in this respect. The cause which makes a dwarf or a giant of the same insect, irrespective of its sex, can be only the smaller or greater quantity of food.
Allowing myself to be guided by the logic of things, I shall therefore complete the story of the Twelve-spotted Mylabris as follows. The mother lays her eggs underground near the spots frequented by the foster-mothers. The recently-hatched young grubs leave their lodgings in September and travel within a restricted radius in search of burrows containing food.
The primary larva of the Mylabris therefore does not imitate those of the Sitaris and the Oil-beetle; it does not settle in the fleece of its host to get itself carried to the cell crammed with victuals. The task of seeking and finding the heap of food falls upon its own shoulders. The small number of the eggs that constitute a batch also leads to the same conclusion.
As a standard of comparison, the Four-spotted Mylabris, of a more imposing size, was added to the first two. A fourth, Zonitis mutica, whom I did not need to consult, knowing that she was not connected with the matter in hand and being familiar with her pseudochrysalis, completed my school of egg-layers. I proposed, if possible, to obtain her primary larva.
Nor is this all: the few nymphs obtained have curious antennæ, ending in a full, irregular tuft, the like of which is found only in the antennæ of the male Cerocoma. The Mylabris, therefore, must be eliminated; the antennæ, in the nymph, must be regularly jointed, as they are in the perfect insect. There remains the Cerocoma.
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