iff! THE LIBRARY OF THE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA PRESENTED BY PROF. CHARLES A. KOFOID AND MRS. PRUDENCE W. KOFOID EPISODES OF INSECT LIFE. EPISODES OF N S E C T I F E BY ACHETA DOMESTICA, M.E.S. EDITED AND REVISED BY THE REV. J. G. WOOD, M.A., F.L. S. LONDON: BELL AND DALDY, YORK STREET, CO VENT GARDEN, AND 186, FLEET STREET. 1867. CHISW1CK PliESS : PRINTED BY WHITTKNGHAM AND WILKINS, TOOKS COURT, CHANCERY LANE. PREFACE. HE Editor hopes that this abridged form of (e Episodes of Insect Life " retains all the beauties of the original edition, while it is freed from the repetitions, and other defects, which resulted from the manner in which the original volumes were successively produced. The reader's attention is specially directed to the illus- trations, which represent insects and scenes in their life. The minuteness with which the artist has reproduced every characteristic detail is truly admirable ; and even in small insects, which are drawn of their natural size, the artist has been equally conscientious, not neglecting a single joint of the antenna?, nor each claw of the tiny foot. Most of the drawings must be examined, as the insect itself must be viewed, with the aid of a magnifying vi PREFACE. glass ; and not until this is done, will the singular truth- fulness of their execution be seen. The letterpress is a mixture of scientific facts with fanciful invention, sometimes investing insects with human attributes, and sometimes placing mankind on a level with the insect. In all cases the object of the writer has been twofold : firstly, to display graphically the salient points in insect life, and secondly, to promote a kindly feeling towards insects. J. G. W. CONTENTS AND DESCRIPTION OF VIGNETTES. FRONTISPIECE. MOTHS IN GENERAL. A group of Moths agents and emblems of decay holding their twi- light or nocturnal revels amidst the ruins of a noble structure, of the transition period from early English to the decorated style, the work of man. The large descending flier in the centre of the window is the Hawk- Moth " Death's Head" (Acherontia Atropos") ; beneath it, to the left, the de- licately pencilled " Puss " (Cerura vinula); that to the right, still lower, the Red Underwing (Catacola nupta). Following upwards the framework of the window, from its lower right hand corner, we come first to the Goat-Moth (Cossus ligniperda), in downward flight; above, distinguished by its eyed or ocellated pinions, ascends the "Emperor" (Saturnia pavonia) ; higher, and next in order, rises the little " Bark Clothes-Moth " (Tinea corticella) ; and above, within the point of the arch, the partico- loured "Magpie" (Abraxas grossulariata). Within the point of the left- hand arch of the window is the angular-winged " Swallow-tail" (Owra- pteryx samlucaria). On the same side, descending with the frame, we meet next with the " Buff- tip " (Pygaera Bucephala) ; below, resting on the stone- work, the " Herald" (Scoliopteryx libatrix) ; and, rising from the left-hand corner, the large, dark-winged "Hawk of the Convolvulus" (Sphinx Con- vokuli). The two moths of greatly differing size, within the highest com- partment of the window, are an " Angleshades " (Phlognphora lncipara\ and a little "Clearwing" (JEgeria tipuliformis). All the Moths in the above engraving are drawn half the size of nature. Most of them, as perfect insects, are described in the episode called " Moths as Idlers," p. 272 ; and some, in their preparatory stages are referred to in "Moths as Destructives," p. 104, and in "Moths as Operatives," p. 239 ; also, in " The Tribes of an Oak," p. 173. viii CONTENTS. TITLE-VIGNETTE. Page " So issue forth the Seasons." First we have WINTER in his mer- riest mood, represented by the Cricket, bedecked Avith Christmas holly, and alive with fun and jollitj'. By his right hand he holds the Brimstone Butterfly, emblem of SPRING, primrose of papilionsin habits and in hue. Beneath, the jocund Grasshopper, linked to the above by a vernal wreath, figures the bright SUMMER, and in the glowing Peacock Butterfly, rich in her velvet train as the autumnal flowers she frequents, we welcome AUTUMN, bearing the ripe sheaf, and presenting her merry associate with the fruit cf the vine. JANUARY. 1. THE CRICKET. INTRODUCTORY . . ... . 1 "Episodes, then, they shall be called/' Symbolic portrait of the author in his character of the Cricket, Acheta domestica, selecting a title for his lucubrations 7 2. THE POINTS OF OUR HOBBY 8 "To the end of tijne this will carry ws." Emblems of riches, rank, and the, pomps and vanities of life outweighed in the balance by the author's hobby of Entomology under the figure of a May-Fly . 1 5 3. FLIES IN WINTER, AND A FLY LEAF 16 " Try Lightness, friend Poet ." A leaf of the Poet's epic failure, exposed to the critical scrutiny of a fly on its return to the author from a butter-shop ......... 23 4. THE GNAT. A LIFE OF BUOYANCY 24 " Let us strive to he p up our buoyancy." The buoyant Gnat Pupa, [J and the winged Gnat, which half flies, half walks upon the water, figuring the light spirits which dance upon the stream of life, and are unsubmerged by the missiles of care . . . . .29 5. THE WOOD-ANT AND THE APHIDES 30 "No one took notice of our poor dripping traveller." The luxuriant and well-fed Aphis, in fashionable attire and sheltered from the storm by her acorn-cup parasol, passes disdainfully by the starving but industrious Ant, seated unsheltered, naked, and solitary, on a toad -stool 3.5 CONTENTS. ix Page FEBRUARY. 6. LIFE IN DEATH 36 " In the, apparent death of winter." The author, Acheta domestica, in his propensity for burrowing among the hidden secrets of nature, explores a catacomb of the chrysalides of Moths and Butterflies, with the view of detecting life amidst frost, and snow, and torpor . 43 7. A MILITARY EXPEDITION, BATTLE OF THE AMAZONS . 44 " How flows the tide of battled Ant Amazons, chieftains of Rufia, hand to hand with the'"citizens of Fusca, fighting for the rape and rescue of infant subjects to be converted by the aggressors into slaves 49 8. INSECT AERONAUTS, SPIDERS 50 " All seem bent upon ascension." A spider aeronaut ascending in his gossamer balloon 55 9. THE FRESH- WATER SIREN 56 " Her mail -dad opponent his falchion plied." The Siren of the Poem, hideous above water, beauteous beneath it, changes under her adversary's thrust into the Water Spider, whose habits the tale is intended to illustrate. Her Knightly foe finds his insect prototvpe in the Water Beetle 63 MARCH. 10. USES OF INSECTS 64 " The Locust after its kind." A professor of the culinary art, anti- cipating the time when Pates de Sauterelles will be considered as great a luxury among the Epicures of our own country, as the Locust is in the present day among certain inhabitants of Syria, Arabia, Persia, Ethiopia, Egypt, and Barbary . . . .71 11. ON APHIDES 72 " The Larva wolf in the Aphis flock" The part of a wolf in sheep's clothing performed by the larva of a Lacewing Fly, Chrysopa perla, as it makes havoc among a flock of wool-coated Apple Aphides, Eriosoma lanigerum, under cover of their empty skins ... 79 12. INSECT SENSES 80 " The passions are expressed by sounds." A sentimental Grasshop- per performing his moonlight serenade, whilst his ladye love directs b x CONTENTS. Page her listening antennae to the quarter whence the strains proceed. The light guitar furnished to the amative Gryllus by Fancy, ranks not more properly as an instrument of music, than does that organ ot sweet sounds, the gift of nature, which he plays on at nature's bidding 87 13. A DEFENCE OF WASPS 88 "A widowed winter survivor." Portrait of a notable insect charac- ter, a widowed Wasp, one of the few forlorn winter-survivors of a populous summer colony, and the destined foundress of a future spring settlement, weeping over the remains of a defunct partner, deposited in an acorn-shell . . . . .95 APRIL. 14. THE ROYAL REFORM,-BEES AS A BODY POLITIC . 96 " The aged Professor of the Mesmeric art." A youthful Queen-Bee under the benevolising operation of a mesmerising Nurse-worker of her race, a practitioner in Phreno-magnetism : an allegory of the curious process of conversion in Bee Queen-making, discovered by Schirach in his " La Reine des Abeilles" 103 15. MOTHS AS DESTRUCTIVES . . . .'"..... . .104 " Two Moths still lingered." Moths of the Banners of the tale, illus- trating by the armorial bearings on the wings of one, and the equipage on the wings of the other, the two consuming principles of Pride of Birth and Pride of Show Ill 16. WATER DEVILS 112 " He rows with infinite speed." A Boat-Fly punt, with crew of dia- bolic aspect, queer and cruel, fit passengers for Charon's ferry-boat. The captive of the party with uplifted arms represents a young and imperfect Water Scorpion, and the shadowy imp employed in the erection of the flag, exhibits the linear form and piercing proboscis of the Water- Measurer. In the head of the rower is depicted that of the aquatic larva of the Dragon-Fly, with face concealed by a natural mask capable of being depressed or raised, shut or opened at pleasure. Of the passengers seated near the prow, one has a nearly similar visor, whilst the female is invested with the features of the Boat-Fly, resembling those which form the figure-head of the boat 119 17. BUTTERFLIES IN GENERAL 120 " In her hours of supposed privacy." The painted Lady Butterfly, Cynthia Cardui, whose Memoirs deserve a volume to themselves, if only for the moral they teach, CONTENTS. xi Page " Such mistresses dare never come in rain For fear their colours should be washed away ; " of equal application to the summer-day flutterer of fashion, and this, her prototype of the insect world, the Cynthia of the Thistle, upon which plant she loves to regale as a spiny caterpillar, before putting on her butterfh' attire 128 MAY. 18. THE LADYBIRD OF OUR CHILDHOOD . . . .129 " No doubt, Sir, an Entomologist?" The author, in his character of Acheta domestica, makes a new acquaintance, who keeps Lady- birds 137 19. COMING OUT 138 " See, Heaven's own emblem of the soul." The sinner exhorted, by the symbol of insect transformation, to (t come out " from the sen- sual debasements of his fallen nature . . . . . .149 20. THINGS OF A DAY 150 " These stand their purposed day." An ephemeral establishment for ephemeral education ; one, as the other, temporary in design rotten in foundation 155 21. INSECT MAGICIANS 156 " Oh! most royal retribution!" Subject to the wand of a Fairy Cynips, the shade of the Merry Monarch sits imprisoned in an oak- apple 163 JUNE. 22. A LOVE AMONG THE ROSES 164 " There's a pet for you!" Stag-Beetle, Lucanus Cervus, exhibits its playful propensities by tossing a ball of cotton on its horns no fancy, but attested fact 171 23. THE TRIBES OF AN OAK 172 " Even the acorn has its appropriator" A golden Cicada, a little shovel-headed frequenter of the Oak, plays the part of Jehu to a " Devil's Coach-horse" (or Rove Beetle), harnessed to an acorn car 181 24. A FEW FRIENDS OF OUR SUMMER GLADNESS . .182 " Sipping their cups of dew." A. trio of thirsty Buttei flies, the demoiselles Pontia and Vanessa seated foremost at their leafy board 191 xii CONTENTS. Page 25. LE LUCCIOLE ... 192 " Thou shalt not want for diamonds." The Lucciole, to the Italian peasant objects of dread, have been by the Italian lady employed as articles of decoration living gems imprisoned in gauze for adorn- ment of her hair 203 JULY. 26. LEASES OF LIFE ... 204 " They set me at defiance ! " The power of death defied miraculously by a swarm of Bees, which, according to an accredited relation, be- came revivified under process of boiling with their combs . .211 27. A SYLVAN MORALITY, OR A WORD TO WIVES . .212 " Arrayed in likeness of the Faery Queen." Acheta domestica in his study surprised by the appearance of the young wife, attired for a fancy ball, in character of Queen Mab 221 28. BUSINESS AND PLEASURE 222 "Heedless of Business and of Pleasure." Pleasure with her gar- land, Business with her cart-rope, try, equally in vain, to raise the drowsy drone from his luxurious rose-leaf pillow .... 229 29. INSECT MINSTRELSY 230 " The classic Cicada, the grassy Gryllus, and the deep-toned Dor.'' A musical trio composed of the above . . . . .237 30. MOTHS AS OPERATIVES 238 " Head amongst caterpillars of his craft." Cossus, the Master- Carpenter of Moth operatives, on the look-out for business in heart of oak and willow 247 AUGUST. 31. A SUMMER DAY'S DREAM 248 " That victim no idle fly." A giant in augmented bulk takes ven- geance on his enemy of the broom 255 32. FAIR AND FIERCE 256 " Tremble on the approach of your arch-destroyer." A trembl ng " White" of the garden about to fall into the embrace (to Butter- flies always fatal) of a great Green Dragon- Fly .... 263 CONTENTS. xiii Page 33. RESEMBLANCE AND RELATION . . . . . .264 " Queer creatures! neither grass nor grasshoppers." Museum visi- tors, lost in astonishment at the vegetable- seeming insect speci- mens from India and China, the leaf-like, and its relative, the stalk-like Mantis 271 34. MOTHS AS IDLERS 272 " Luxurious feeders amongst lazy flatterers." A trio of Moths drinking deeply of honied wine, out of a flower flagon . . . 280 SEPTEMBER. 35. LOVERS OF PLEASURE 281 " Thou dost dance and thou dost sing." A pair of Gryllidae^ Anac- reontic types and patterns of supreme happiness .... 289 36. PARASITES 290 " The Puss, in its greatness, a prey to parasites." Wealth and grandeur, in likeness of a " Puss Caterpillar" (a prince amongst its fat fraternity), at once drained and incensed by parasitic satel- lites of the tribe Ichneumon ..... ,297 37. INSTINCTS OF MATERNITY 298 " Admire the dexterity of the Leaf-cutter Bee." A Maternal " Upholstress " shaping the material of her leaf-lined nest, which, in form of a cradle, is represented near her 305 38. FATHER LONGLEGS AND HIS FAMILY . . . .306 " How vast (to an emmet) its stupendous elevation ! " A spacious platform and commanding observatory for creeping millions . .313 OCTOBER. 39. THE SCARAB^EUS AND ITS MODERN WORSHIPPERS . 314 " The Scarabau*. an amasser of filth, fit emblem of mammon wor- ship." The Dung Beetle, set up on high for the adoration of the sordid ...... .321 xiv CONTENTS. Page 40. INSECT DIRGE-PLAYERS 322 " Phantoms foot it to the Deathwatch drum." A dance of death got up. at Superstition's bidding, to the beat of the dreaded Death- watch 329 41. SHORT LIVES AND LONG 33 " The threads of inject life are variously apportioned." The Parcse meting the lengths of insect existence, allowing them the shortest measure in their perfect and brightest stages .... 337 42. STARS OF THE EARTH - 338 " Inquire we the uses of the Glowworm's lamp?" It here supplies to a studious fairy the purpose of the midnight oil ... 345 NOVEMBER. 43. INSECT MOVEMENTS 346 " In the sioift Tiger and slow Oil-Beetles, see the fabled hare and tortoise." The rapid Cicindela, diverted from its course by the sight of insect prey, exemplifies anew the old adage, that " the race is not always to the swift " 355 44. FOR THOSE WHO ARE NOT OVER-NICE . . . .356 " Steeds of mettle and muscle, for a steeple- chase in earnest." If chases such as these were never calendered in graver fashion if, as here, the vaulters were but Fleas the chase but "coming off" on paper, the horse might leap for joy, the man rise higher, that is, to his proper place, as an animal of reason and humanity . . . 365 45. STORY OF AN OGRE 366 " Together with the ball they lift her on their shoulders." The For- mic heroine (a captive Ant) escapes from the clutches of the Ant- lion Ogre, by concealment in the hollow ball (pupariwri) of the monster's own weaving ........ 379 46. PAINTING, CARVING, AND GILDING 380 " You shame our trumpery drawing." Acheta throws down his pencil in despair at the inimitable perfection of his living patterns . 385 DECEMBER. 47. SPIDERS IN THEIR ANALOGIES WITH OTHER ORDERS OF CREATION 386 " Where are snare-setters existent but amongst human animals and Spiders?'' The Man Bird-catcher emulated in his trade by the Spider Fly-catcher 393 CONTENTS. xv Page 48. A NEW GALLERY OF PRACTICAL SCIENCE . . . 394 " We challenge all the nations." Insect artisans, whose tools of divine adaptation, and works divinely guided, defy, unpresumingly, all human competition 403 49. TWO THINGS OF DIFFICULT DEFINITION . . .404 " More ways than one of getting at the bottom of a secret" A portly Humble Bee, one too bulky for entrance at the spring door of the Snapdragon, leading to its nectary, bores a hole at the bottom of the floral cask to obtain its honeyed wine 413 50. THE SPIRITS OF HEARTH AND HOME . . . .414 " Memory, painter of the past, let us invoke thee" Acheta, in a re- view of past stages, traces the development of his own imago, his present self 430 The House Cricket, Acheta domestica, gaining access to the milk-jug by a sprig of holly. THE CRICKET. INTRODUCTORY. N eminent French Entomologist, Reaumur, has very justly observed, that " it is certainly no fault of Nature's if we do not possess works upon Insects which everybody may read with pleasure." His most amusing, though rather voluminous publication, * Memoires pour servir a 1'Histoire des Insectes/ 1734, went far to supply 2 in his time, the deficiency at which he hints, and in ours, amidst the multitude of familiar books on every subject, it might certainly be supposed that there is no lack of such as would suit and please everybody on this. No inquisitive mind need complain of any want of keys for the simple opening of that drawer in Nature's cabinet (a drawer 2 NATURE'S CABINET. of gems) which has been labelled " Entomology." Of these there are an abundance, gilded keys of popular, as well as iron keys of scientific manufacture, but the still prevailing want is an incitement to place them in the lock. The works of Kirby and Spence, Eennie and Jardine, Burmeister and Westwood, may be said to furnish, pre-eminently, the gilded, or, with reference to their intrinsic worth, the golden keys in question ; but seeing how generally even these are left to tarnish on the shelf, some- thing would seem to be required as an incentive to their more frequent handling. The most prevalent feeling about Insects, except, perhaps, the " busy people" of the hive or the " painted populace" of the garden, is that of indifference, if not distaste ; and who of the multitude thus ignorantly prepossessed, would seek for books strictly devoted to their history, or believe that they could find interest in the mere relation of their instincts, how- ever pleasantly detailed ? The first anxiety of a writer is, as all the world knows, to establish a kindly sympathy between himself and his readers ; but how can this be speedily created betwixt one who, as an Entomologist, would seem to think of nothing but Insects, and " the many" who have always regarded them as below a passing thought? With even a slight knowledge, once acquired, of their wondrous ways, the latter will be induced to a confession that these " Minims of Creation" are something, even in them- selves; but it may be well, meanwhile, for him who would bring them into general notice, to invest them with the charm of adventitious interest and reflected consequence. Insects are peculiarly capable of being thus treated; for in their analogies and correspondences, illustrative and emblematic, innumerable are their relations with other things, from the most trifling objects of the world we live in, up to the highest subjects of human contemplation. Multiplied then, and still multiplying, as are books on Entomology, we venture to think there is yet scope and use for one of a character more discursive, a book EPISODES. 3 not professing to teach the science, but to persuade to its study those who may have time and opportunity for the pursuit ; and to show those who have not, that they may, nevertheless, find interest and pleasure in common observation (not commonly exercised) of the insect million by which they are surrounded. With a confidence that some such work might be generally read, though by no means equally assured of our ability to write one, we long had wavering thoughts of making the attempt. At last we resolved to try, reminded by a returning epoch (a brush, en passant, from the wing of time) that while we doubt and linger, " La vie & differer se passe." The end of the year was at hand : " To-morrow," said we to ourselves, " we will really begin a work for everybody about Insects. This very evening shall be devoted to a final decision on its plan ;" for under a hundred Protean forms, and almost as many different names, had our intended work been floating for months before our " mind's eye." Letters Sketches Conversations, these were familiar shapes into which our materials might be moulded ; but they seemed, in one sense, too familiar ; the public taste might be tired of these hackneyed modes of dressing up the sister sciences. Besides, clothing such as this, however light, would overmuch confine us in the very discursive rambles which we had thoughts of taking amongst our creepers, and fliers, and swimmers. Episodes might better serve our purpose, and impose fewer shackles on our roving fancy : Episodes, then, they shall be called Episodes of Insect Life, providing every month a seasonable admixture of the Real and the Ideal. But to-morrow, and for a month to come, what insects will be in season ? Of all the summer myriads, the bulk have long ago expired ; the remnant, scared even by the shadow of advancing winter, betook themselves to hidden places ; and now old Christmas has benumbed them with his icy paw, and keeps them unconscious prisoners within the earth or waters. We may still discourse, it is true, of torpid Bees, of sleeping 4 THE NEWBORN TEAR. Ants, of buried Beetles, and a forlorn few of widowed Wasps, stupified by grief or cold, sole relics of their perished race ; but what a drowsy doleful prelude would this be to the cheerful airs we would draw from the harp of nature. These insect sleepers would furnish us with themes of life in death, for in all of them, under forms of death, forms of vitality, arrested or unexpanded, lie hidden ; as in all real deaths, merely natural, are contained the germs of life. Even this departing year does not wholly die, since being full fraught with causes (seeds which are sure to ripen into the fruit of consequences), in these it will continue to live to the end of time, aye, even to eternity ; but believe, and philosophize, and hope as we may, neither death nor death's semblances are the most enlivening objects of contemplation. At all events, we felt our spirits growing flat and our thoughts confused, as we looked at our waning candle (like the year, approaching to its end), and reviewed the subjects, defunct or drowsy, from amongst which we must, perforce, choose one for that of our opening essay. Dreaminess trod on the heels of dullness, and before we had come to a decision as to what sleeping .insect should constitute our commencing theme, we were ourselves nodding beside our solitary fire. Suddenly we were awoke by a clang of bells from the neighbouring steeple of our parish-church, the requiem of the departed, and salutation to the new-born year. It was soon pealed out, and we were left once more to the silence of our little parlour, a silence which seemed deepei than usual, and more solemn, yet not to the spirit's ear unbroken ; for it is in pauses such as these on life's rattling road, that the " still small voice" isalways audible, unless it be drowned, as iscommon, by the noise of social mirth. We sank into a reverie, regretful more than hopeful, of retrospect rather than of prospect, and in the current of mingled thoughts that rushed over it, our lately ruling and uppermost idea (that of our contemplated book) was completely overwhelmed. Of a sudden, however, it was OUR OPENING SUBJECT. 5 again brought to the surface : a shrill sound broke upon the stillness ; another chorus, within the house, succeeded to the hushed peal without. The Crickets, from the kitchen below, were uplifting their chirping strains to salute, in full concert, the new-come year. We were at no loss, now, for at least one cheerful subject wherewith to commence our Episodes. Bless their merry voices for the opportune suggestion ! Forth- with, we took up, not our pen but our candle, and descended to the lower regions, of which we found our chirpers left in sole possession. The noisy varlets broke off, instanter, in their song, and, each to his hole or cranny, scampered off at our approach ; but we captured a straggler in the very act of draining the milk-pot, and carried him off to our parlour fire-side for the cultivation of a more intimate acquaintance, and with a view to making him as well known to our readers, by sight, as he, or rather his merry fraternity are likely to be already by sound. Finish thy song there, little Master ! and, " with what appetite thou mayest," thy supper too ! said we, as we placed our lean lank-bodied prisoner beneath a tumbler, under which we were so merciful as to insert a few crumbs of bread, one of the Cricket's favourite repasts. Aye, leap as thou wilt, and climb against gravity up the smooth walls of thy crystal prison, there thou shalt abide till we have taken thy portrait. Yes, queer creature as thou art ! thy angular figure and round physiognomy shall be exhibited in our first vignette. Thou shalt be honoured as our opening subject, and if thy name had not served already the purpose of one, whose sympathy with thy merry chirrup has been shared by thousands, thou shouldst have given a title to our book, like " The Bee' and other seekers and gatherers of Sweets ! Thou art, in truth, an omnium-gatherer, nothing comes amiss to thy convenient appetite, and variety must be the character of the feast we would provide, no less than of that which thou lovest to devour. True, as we have said, thou art not particular, " scum- mings of pots, sweepings, bread, yeast, flesh and fat of broth," 6 THE CRICKET, A PILFERER. thy pickings most esteemed, seem not, some of them, the most inviting fare ; yet do these dainties, each in its kind, serve to symbolize, not unaptly, the very sort of viands we would seek and set before our readers. For " scummings of pots," suppose we say the " cream of our subject," the most light, and, withal, the richest of the agreeable matter already laid up by others, to be extracted by ourselves in the field of observation. For " sweepings " let us put " gleanings," Gleanings in Entomology and we have the very term adopted by a well-known writer for his amusing anecdotes in various branches of Natural History. Then " bread," with Cricket as with man, the very " staff of life," if poverty forbid him not to grasp it, what substance more properly symbolic of that which must form the ground-work of our book, matters of solid fact, mixed with and lightened by the " yeast " of illustration, discursive and pictorial. As for the " flesh " and " fat," the strongest fare on which the Cricket delighteth to regale, may they not serve to typify that principle of mental nourishment, of all the most vital, afforded by the religious contemplation of all natural objects endowed with life? The Cricket is the thirstiest of all thirsty creatures. He is not therefore " the blither for the drouth," for where no ampler supply of liquid is at hand, he is said (heed it, ye careful housewives !) to gnaw holes in wet woollen stockings or flannel, hung by the fire to dry. Therein, also, (though in more harmless fashion), we would make him our representative, as, thirsting after knowledge of our subject, we strive to extract from it, even when seemingly most arid, a something of refreshing moisture. Lastly, in all his doings, our Cricket is, confessedly, a pilferer, and taking, as we largely must, from stores collected by the labours and observations of others, we shall herein, also, THE FATE OF OUE VENTURE. 7 resemble our prototype, except that we rob in open daylight and thankfully acknowledge what we appropriate. There are yet other points of resemblance, more personal, between ourselves and the house Cricket. As with him, a warm hearth in winter and a sunny bank in summer are the seats of our supreme felicity. Like him, also, we joy in the possession of a quiet retreat, and prefer to uplift our voice from behind a screen. We have now set forth quite as much of our design, and revealed as much of our personality as has become connected with our immediate subject, and from the scattered grains of intimation already dropt, some prying reader may even now have gleaned more about the Cricket's ways and whereabouts than we have thought it expedient to reveal. Something more of them may be disclosed hereafter. Meanwhile, surmise what thou wilt, good gossip ! but, above all, we entreat thee to bear in mind that, alike in our proper and our emblematic cha- racter, we most heartily rejoice in all that warms and all that cheers. sliaU" lir r -1 ' - . ; The Cricket mounted on the back of a magnified May-Fly, Ephemera vulgata, in search of entomological subjects. THE POINTS OF OUR HOBBY. HAT have we here? A May-Fly in January ! A magnified May-Fly ! Verily, Master Cricket, thou dost not only magnify, but most unseasonably misplace the objects of Creation, strangely, tco, dost thou misapply them, for in seating thy domestic self upon the back of this ephemeral high-flier, we are quite at a loss to guess thy meaning. Then, gentle reader, guess not at all, only have patience, and all seeming incongruities shall be reconciled. Suffice it, now, that as in the Cricket we have introduced thee to our symbolic self, so in the May-Fly we would beg thee to recognize OUT symbolic hobby. VARIETIES OF INSECT LIFE. 9 Dear Entomology ! We have called thee our hobby, we have likened thee to a hack ; but thou art more. Thou art a powerful Genie, a light-winged Fairy, not merely bearing us through earth, and sky, and water, but peopling every scene in every element with new and living forms, before invisible. For us, Nature has now no desert places: touched by thy magic wand, every tree has become a peopled city, teeming with busy multitudes; every flower, a pavilion, hung with gorgeous tapestry, for the summer occupation of Insect nobles, clad in velvet, gauze, or coat of mail ; nay, the very moss that grows upon the tree or clothes the stone, has become to us a forest, where, as in forests of larger growth, roam the fierce and the gentle, preying or preyed on by each other ; and the stone, we have only to upturn it, and we are certain almost to discover beneath, some hidden lurker, or some wondrous subterranean structure, perhaps a solitary dwelling, perhaps a nursery, perhaps a general home of refuge. Yes, our darling pursuit, of all most lightsome and life-giving, with thee for our companion, the bare, the barren, the desolate, and the death-like become instinct with life. The arid heath, the decaying tree, the mouldering wall are converted at once into fertile fields of interest and inquiry, while the summer skies and glittering waters grow brighter yet with glancing wings and oar-like feet ; and with the knowledge that both are plied by a multitude of happy creatures. Entomology signifies the study of Insects, from whose pe- culiar formation the term owes its origin ; the bodies of this part of the Animal Creation being inserted, or divided into three principal parts, head, trunk, and abdomen, besides other subdivisions. For this reason, the Latin name Insecta, Greek "Evro/ta, from whence Entomology. Now of these little insected animals, thus curiously divided from the rest of animated nature (except the Crustacea, once also classed as Insects), many great men of antiquity, philosophers as well as poets, thought no scorn. Among these, 10 PRIMITIVE ENTOMOLOGISTS. Aristotle, Pliny, and Virgil wrote of them largely, though, indeed, somewhat erroneously ; the former, with other similar fables, asserting not only that flies were meat-engendered (a notion still ignorantly entertained), but that they also inherited a disposition, fierce or harmless, according to that of their flesh-fathers, when in life. Quite as absurdly, though more poetically, Virgil says or sings of Bees that " From herbs and fragrant flowers They call their young." With these and similarly confused notions about the origin of Insects and other created beings, their beauties and wonders had, certainly, much less claim upon the notice of the ancients than on ours, who have acknowledged them for the work of one Divine Hand, and regarded them as visible tokens of that Divine Mind of which they are thus permitted to afford us a partial revelation ; but since with incentives comparatively slight, the study of nature in general, and of Insects in particular, was yet deemed by enlightened heathens worthy of infinite attention, is it not strange that the classic robe which has so often lent a dignity to a host of insignificancies, should not at least have defended poor Entomology from neglect or ridicule ? Yet so it has not been. On the revival of general learning, there appeared in Europe a few works in which Insects were noticed among other objects of natural history; but it was not, we believe, till the reign of Charles the First that they obtained in England the honour of a whole Latin book to themselves, and were introduced to the learned public in Mouffet's Theatrum Insectorum. An English translation 1 followed,, and a curious old book it is, giving a complete view of all that was then known on the subject of Insects, with much information since confirmed, and with it an infinitely larger portion of gravely and quaintly affirmed nonsense, perhaps not the least amusing 1 Theatre of Insects, Mazerne. ENTHUSIASM OF SWAMMERDAM. 11 part of the production. It is amply adorned with figures, many of them amusing too, from their very imperfection. Some of the greatest men are, perhaps, to be found among those who pursue little objects, those, we mean, held as little in general estimation; such people are great in their discernment to discover the real worth of what is commonly despised, and they are greater still in their independence of spirit to follow up objects whose pursuit exposes them to ridicule, and whose attainment is little likely to bring them admiration or repute. Well, in the 17th century, several gifted individuals, in this sense very great, appeared and took neglected Entomology by the hand. Chief among these were the English Ray and the Dutch Swammerdam. Insects were then found capable of exciting enthusiastic energy, incompa- rable patience, and fervent piety. " Oh," says Swammerdam, while studying for his work on the habits and structure of Bees, " Oh, for one year of continued light and heat, that I might work without interruption !" Such was his enthusiasm. In his admirable dissection of Insect anatomy he has left a record of his perseverance, equalled, however, by Boerhaave, who could employ a whole day in clearing one Caterpillar from its fat, and by Lyonnet, who counted 1804 aerial tubes in the body of another, whose structure formed the chief study of his life ; and for piety, that of Swammerdam finds ardent expression in the following apostrophe, drawn forth by the wonder and beauty of those divine mechanisms which patience had laid open to his own and others' observation : " Oh God !" he exclaims, " how Thy works infinitely surpass the reach of our feeble understandings ; all that we actually know of Thee, or ever can, is but a faint and lifeless shadow of Thy adorable perfections, in contemplation of which the brightest understandings grow bewildered !" With the same feelings, inspired by similar objects, our venerable Ray composed his work called " The Wisdom of God manifested in the Works of Creation." And again, it was the interest excited by 12 MADAME MERIAN. Insect forms, their singularity and surpassing beauty, which, in the same era, inspired the artistic pencil of a Merian, and induced her, with a woman's energy, to cross the seas, and brave the noxious climate of Surinam, for the sake of its curious and splendid Insects. These she has as truthfully depicted ; * though misled, perhaps, by her own enthusiasm into a too ready credence of the marvellous, the accuracy of her accompanying descriptions has been more than questioned. Thus in the latter end of the 17th and beginning of the 18th centuries, a few among the most highly endowed with talent, learning, and piety, considered the study of Entomology not unworthy to constitute the grand pursuit of life ; yet, at this very period, in such low estimation was it generally held, nay, so extravagant or childish was it deemed, that we are told by Kirby of an attempt to set aside the will of a rational woman (Lady Glanville) on the ground of lunacy, evinced solely by her fondness for collecting Insects. Ray himself had to appear as a witness of her sanity. How was it that his own escaped impeachment ? For all this, and calmly smiling at the scoffs of the vulgar ignorant and vulgar learned, Entomology marched on steadily, supported by a phalanx of staunch professors, such as Reaumur (called the French Pliny), Lyonnet, Bonnet, Gould, the historian of English Ants, the Swede, Baron de Geer, and at the head of all, his illustrious countryman, Linnaaus. From the glow-worm light in which it had so long glim- mered, Entomology now shone, as it were, in the radiance of a swarm of Fire-flies. Yet this, her augmented brightness, did but serve for a season to make her a more conspicuous butt for the shafts of ridicule ; and many a quill was shot, in derision, at this persecuted science, which could only have been aimed with any show of fairness at her merest classifiers and collectors, such as every branch of Natural History may number among the lesser minded of its votaries. But even 1 Insects of Surinam. PERSECUTION OF THE SCIENCE. 13 persons like these, who would seem in the words of the satirist to " Think their eyes And reason given them, but to study flies," may still perhaps be followers of objects not a whit less insignificant than those which occupy their neighbours ; only that the pursuits of the many escape ridicule, because they are sought along the high-ways instead of the bye-ways of wasted life. But the laugh at Entomology is nearly spent. Known professors of the science, and members of its 11 Society," may now assemble in council and communicate their observations and inquiries without fear of becoming themselves subjects for a commission De lunatico inquirendo, and Butterfly-hunters, net in hand, may now chase their game without being themselves made game of. In recent times, the works of Latreille, Lamarck, Cuvier, Curtis, Leach, Macleay, with many more, have been gradually improving the science which their names adorn, while Kirby and Spence, 1 Rennie, 2 Jardine, 3 Knapp, 4 Burmeister, 5 and Westwood, 6 have pub- lished their researches to the multitude in works, which, were they as popular as they should be, would have a place not only in every library, but in every body's hand, to serve literally as hand-books in their country rambles. Return we now to the great volume on which the above are but imperfect commentaries ! that volume, bound in ethereal blue, and at this our chosen chapter, printed in living characters on leaves of every tint from vernal 4 green to the richest hues of autumn ; nay, on the brown or snow-white sheet of winter, for at no season is the student of Entomology presented with an entire blank. Even in the month of January, besides our chirping representative of the hearth and certain 1 Introduction to Entomology. 2 Insect Transformations, Architecture, and Miscellanies. 3 Naturalist's Library : Beetles and Butterflies. 4 Journal of a Naturalist. & Manual of Entomology. 6 Introduction to the Classification of Insects. 14 NATURE'S VOLUME. Gnats which disport over frozen pools, a sprinkling of other Insects may be seen melting their frosted fluids in the wintry sunbeam or the sheltered window. Numerous others, hidden from all but practised eyes, are laid up snugly in various hybernacula of which the discovery adds a zest to their pursuit. Of these, some are concealed in caverns under ground, some in beds of mud beneath the water, some are ensconced in hollow trees, and behind or in crannies of their bark, while others lurk within the tunnels of dry perforated stalks, sleep within the domes of protecting gall-nuts, or lie defended from frost and famine in other homes of shelter, such as the care of Him who careth for all has led them so seek out. Using our hobby as a hunter, we may pursue our game for two different objects ; that of observation or collection, or both combined. And we may collect for two different purposes ; that of scrutinizing living instincts, or arranging and looking at dead objects. As for him whose delight in natural objects, of what kind soever, consists solely in their amassment, or is cir- cumscribed within the walls of his cabinet, he is no naturalist at all, a mere kindred spirit of the Bibliomaniac, and little better than the miser whose iron heart is in his iron chest. Neither are specimens necessary to the study of Insects, though, like the Hortus Siccus of the botanist, they are of great as- sistance, especially at its commencement. Subsequently, if you should desire to collect, we would recommend the pursuit, for this purpose, of one selected tribe ; say, Beetles, as the most varied and perfect, or Butterflies and Moths, as the most elegant and interesting of the Insect classes. The study of the latter only, in the search after Caterpillars, the feeding them on fresh leaves of such plants as they frequent, and the opportu- nities thus afforded of watching them through their changes, transformations, and most ingenious labours, will afford ample occupation and amusement for nearly every season of the year, and moreover present us, if we choose, a collection of cabinet paintings, in whose exhibition and contemplation FORCE OF MOEAL RIGHT. 15 (always with reference to their Great Designer) we may take a laudable delight. For Aurelians, or collectors of Moths and Butterflies, this month and the following constitute one of the great harvest seasons. Trowel in hand, they are now repairing to the leafless woods, where carefully digging a few feet around the trunks of the trees, they " disquiet and bring up" from their winter catacombs, the mummy-like aurelias of various Moths which, as Caterpillars, have fattened in summer on the foliage above. Such as are disposed to become Aurelians themselves, must have in readiness for their treasures, thus exhumed, boxes of wood or pasteboard partly filled with vegetable earth, and covered at top with gauze. The Chrysalides consigned to their earthy bed, there should be laid over them a green coverlet of moss, which, once a fortnight in winter and oftener in summer, should be steeped in water for the purpose of giving moisture to the mould beneath. " - f o tin- mil irf tniir tins will carry us " A magnified representation of the House Fly, Musca domestica, crawling up a volume in the natural history library. To the left is a highly magnified figure of the foot, and in the centre are the larva and pupa of another species much resembling it, abundant in its imperfect stages between the membranes of dock leaves. FLIES IN WINTER, AND A FLY LEAF. HE Flies are gone, but where are they gone to? that is the question. At the close of summer, when they are busy and buzzing around us in the shape of a visitation, it is certainly no easy matter to let them " pass by us as the idle wind;" but in one respect they are, to most people, like the wind too, since they scarce know whence they come or whither they go. Doubt the first, as to whence they come, is not difficult to solve, though perhaps with the most EGGS OF FLIES. 17 presuming of Flies, as with the most presuming of folks, the more we pry into their places of birth, the more we may be in- clined (but with the insect not justly) to hold them in contempt; suffice it, that as the domestic Fly makes himself quite at home in our houses, so has his parent, in all likelihood, made herself equally free of our stables, where she finds a hot-bed for her eggs, and in the same a provision for her infant race. There, in their first and wingless state of maggot or lava, they com- mence, thus early, their important use of helping to rid the earth of all things that offend, and on how grand a scale they are able to carry on this operation may be estimated from the fact, that a single Fly will lay no less than 177 eggs. House Flies come then chiefly from the stable, the road, and the grazing meadow ; though some nearly resembling them come from other places, and exist in their earliest state on vegetable, instead of animal substances. Among these we have noticed a very common species, which finds its first " bed arid board" between the upper and under skins of dock-leaves, burrowing and feeding on the pulpy flesh. From spring to autumn we may see them thus busily employed, merely by gathering and holding to the light such leaves as are to be found continually, not adorned by large, discoloured, transparent blotches, the outward tokens of their inward presence. These, from the above habit, may be ranked among a set of insect labourers or feeders of more classes than one, hence called Leaf-miners, some of whose winding ways we mean, by and by, to follow. A Fly on the wing is a no less curious object than one on foot, yet when do we trouble our heads about it, except as a thing which troubles us ? The most obvious wonder of its flight is its variety of direction, most usually forwards, with the back upwards, like a bird, but on occasion, backwards, with the back downwards, as when starting from the window and alighting on the ceiling. 1 Marvellous velocity is another of its charac- 1 Mudie. 18 FLY FEEDING. teristics. By fair comparison of sizes, what is the swiftness of a race-horse, clearing his mile a minute, to the speed of the Fly cutting through her third of the same distance in the same time ? x And what the speed of our steaming giants, the grand puffers of the age, compared with the swiftness of our tiny buzzers, of whom a monster train, scenting their game afar, may even follow partridges and pheasants on the wings of steam in their last flight as friendly offerings? But however, with their game, the Flies themselves would be most " in keeping" on an atmospheric line, a principal agent in their flight, as well as in that of other Insects, being the air. This enters from the breathing organs of their bodies into the nerves and muscles of their wings ; from which arrangement, their velocity depends, not alone on muscular power, but also on the state of the atmosphere. Lastly, how does the Fly feed ? the " busy curious thirsty Fly" that " drinks with me," but does not " drink as I," his sole instrument for eating and drinking being his trunk or sucker, the narrow pipe, by means of which, when let down upon his dainties, he is enabled to imbibe as much as suits his capacity. This trunk might seem an instrument convenient enough when inserted into a saucer of syrup, or applied to the broken surface of an over-ripe blackberry, but we often see our sipper of sweets quite as busy on a solid lump of sugar, which we shall find on close inspection growing f< small by degrees" under his attack. How, without grinders, does he accomplish the consumption of such crystal condiment? A magnifier will solve the difficulty, and show how the Fly dissolves his rock, Hannibal fashion, by a diluent, a salivary fluid passing down through the same pipe which returns the sugar melted into syrup. The Fly is a perfect Insect (or Imago), having already passed through its two preparatory stages of transformation, those of Larva and Pupa (see vignette), corresponding to what, 1 Kirby and Spence. A FLY-LEAF. 19 with the Butterfly, is more generally known as Caterpillar and Chrysalis 5 so that, like the Butterfly, when winged it grows no more. Once more to our picture. You know, we suppose, that the Fly has a pair of wings ; but a hundred to one, if one of you out of a hundred has ever noticed that she has also a pair of winglets (or little secondary wings), and a pair of poisers, drum-stick like appendages between the main wings and the body, employed for assisting and steadying her flight. These poisers are much more conspicuous and easily observed without a magnifier in the Gnat and in the Father Longlegs, insects belonging to the same order as Flies. Did it ever occur to you to notice the prismatic painting of a Fly's nervous pinion the iridescent colours wherewith its glassy membrane seems overlaid ? If not, only look, we pray you, in a proper light at the next of its kind you may chance to meet with, and if, as is most likely, it comes to tell you a pleasant tale of approaching spring time, we are verily sure that you will see a hundred rainbows painted on its wing. A FLY-LEAF. Our friend H had the misfortune to be cast up a poet on the stream of Life, since, in this age of mechanism, it has been turned into a mill-stream. Consequently, he found himself held as a mere bubble in the froth or scum of society, and his residence accorded perfectly with such estimation. He was the highest occupant of a house in a low London neighbour- hood, where, nevertheless, he was looked down upon as a nobody. Poor H was a worker in the tread-mill of low periodicals, wherein, for ever climbing, each weary round of the month and year left him just where he was at the beginning; but in spite of this his daily labour, he had taken hours, which should have been of rest, for independent composition. One poem, a pon- derous epic, with his name on the title-page, had alreadv been 20 HOPE. sent abroad into the world; but it had gone forth, like its author, unfriended, ill drest, patron wanting, paper and printing paltry. Its reception was accordant; if H had thrown a stone out of his garret window, the passing multitude (at least if it had fallen harmless as his poem) could only have trodden on or over it the same. Yet was he still sanguine and would still believe that his neglected work, stone-like, as he proudly fancied, in solid merit, might one day serve for a pedestal whereon his laurelled statue might be planted. But few are the pedestals formed of a single stone. To complete his, he must, he thought, lay one upon another; so lighted to his labour by the flicker of hope's torch and the flare of tallow candle, he went on working (blockhead as he was !) through many a fireless winter's night at another ponderous block of literature a second epic poem. It was the afternoon of a sultry first of August; " magazine day" just over, the hireling had got a respite from his daily drudgery. He had employed it on the favourite labour of his brain ; but that was ended, his epic was actually completed, even to the last word of the last line of the last fair copy, which was about to be exchanged for notes and notice. The poet wiped his pen with an air of complacency, then wiped his thin face, threw himself back in his rush-bottomed chair, and with half-closed eyes still bent upon his manuscript, his bulky embodiment of thought, indulged in a delicious reverie. For once, all conspired to encourage the poet's day- dream, when it was suddenly broken by the unlooked-for entrance of his tea. The black kettle was placed on the red rusted hob, and a quarter of a pound of salt butter, fresh from the shop, was deposited plateless (but, mind ye, not paperless) on the table. Scarcely were his fretted nerves composed, and the stair relieved from the servant's heavy tread, when from some point unseen arose the voice of an abominable Fly. Buz buz buz louder than buz was ever heard before. The poet looked towards the small window of his sky-parlour. But no Fly was there. H next rose and examined the dark corners THE SIBYLLINE FLY-LEAF. 21 of the room, and then rushed desperately to the corner cup- board, the sole lurking place left unexplored. " Buz ! buz ! buz !" again rose, as if in mockery at the very thought. He returned hopeless to his chair : perhaps it was fancy after all, but presently the Fly's voice rose louder still, closer than ever, to repeat " buz ! buz ! buz !" The Faster at last betook himself, with what appetite he might, to his rigid loaf, his melting butter. He cuts a slice, he proceeds to unfold the printed leaf wherein the dissolving condiment lay curtained. But not alone lay that butter in its melting luxury; a ravisher had been feasting on its charms, and now, out he bounces with a buz indeed, and buz ! buz !! buz !!! re-echoes round, as a burly Blue-bottle, tipsy with love and jollity, mad at escape from thraldom, or merry at discovery, bangs up and bounces again and again against the unopened half of the garret casement. The mystery is out ; yet the Poet stands aghast, fixed as in a stupor of horror and dismay. He scarcely notices the escaped offender; the buz of Blue-bottle now falls unheeded on his ear ; the bouncings of Blue-bottle attract not his eye, for his eye is strained on more appalling objects, on the printed envelope of rancid butter, on the title-page of his first inde- pendent and avowed production, on his own dishonoured name conspicuous in the transparency of grease ! This, then, was the publicity acquired by his first great work, and there, torn from its very self, was the sibylline leaf, which had told, in the warning buz of that prophetic Fly, the coming fate of his second, his still greater work, so laboured, so exquisitely finished. Finished ! it is finished, indeed, with hope, with effort ! So spoke more plainly than could words the deep drawn sigh with which poor H resumed his seat, not, we may be sure, to taste his ill-savoured bread and butter, but only to sip his cold tea, as if to swallow down with it something of chagrin, or to sip in something of consolation. 22 THE FLT AND THE POET. One day, towards the end of the same August, whose first was made, as we have just commemorated, a big black-letter day in our Poet's calendar, he was called on, in the midst of his heaviness, to furnish something light, just to puff out what would else have been a slender number of the Milliner's Magazine. In the same parlour, under much such a heavy sky, before him the same sorry equipage for tea, beside him a like bit of melting butter, nothing would have been wanted, but the Fly defunct, the fly-leaf burned, the manuscript burned too, to bring back to its author's mind, had it been ever absent, that notable era when his second grand Epic was completed. There he sat, like the distressed Poet of the " Moral Painter/' like him might have " plunged for his thought," and like him have " found no bottom there," only that to save diving, he seized the lightsome object brought vividly to remembrance, with all its heavy associations, by the scene, the hour, and the weather. In short, he caught again that villain Fly, and committed him, in the following strain, once more to paper : THE FLY AND THE POET. DARK were the cares of the Poet's breast, Grand were the thoughts of his head, But sad thoughts and grand ones must all be represt, For he had to write nonsense for bread. Proud was the curl on the Poet's lip, And big was the tear in his eye ; Scarce he saw in the inkstand his pen to dip, But he saw on its summit a Fly. There Blue-bottle sat, and stroked down his face With a twirl of his head, twice or thrice, Then says he, " Brother bard I pity your case^ And have brought you a bit of advice. " Nay, man, never wince ! I heed not your scorn, 'Tis a fact, and I'll presently show it, That if not, as you think yourself, Poet born, I'm by place and by feeding a Poet. THE FLY AND THE POET. 23 " I come from a spot where the fruit of the vine, And the oil of the olive abound ; Where Arabia and India their riches combine, And shed spiciest of odours around. " High over blue mountains with snowy white tips, I wander , but use your own eyes, Only look round the shop where you go for your dips, And you'll see the Parnassus of Flies. " And now for my council thus rich the domain, Whence I draw inspiration and bread ; But by lightness, not weight, I this empire maintain, And by emptiness stand on my head. " While others can't climb, using infinite pains, I, gravity turning to jest, Ascend, with all ease, perpendicular planes, Rough or smooth, just as pleases me best. So try lightness, friend Poet I warrant you'll find That as I rule matter, so you may rule mind !" -ls , trinii Bttf ' Transformation of the common Gnat, Cukx pipiens, the eggs united in a boat-like form ; the aquatic larva suspended, head downwards ; the pupa with head upwards ; and, last stage of all, the pupa with the winged gnat emerging from it. THE GNAT. A LIFE OF BUOYANCY. HERE are certain temperaments which, hard as iron, are only acted on, precisely like that sturdy metal, by atmospheric changes. In dull, damp weather they gather an additional coat of rustiness or crustiness, while the finest and driest fails to produce any visible effect upon their aspect or temper. When, however, one grain of mental mercury enters into the compound, our spirits cannot choose but rise at the exhila- rating influence of a bright winter's morning. Besides the effects, merely physical, of a clear bracing frost, the sunshine A WINTER'S WALK. 25 of January, if it warms us less, cheers us more than the sun- shine of June, through the force of contrast contrast with the gloom which has gone before, and is sure to come after con- trast with the dark wintry objects on which it shines ; and perhaps, more than all, contrast with that peculiar stillness which usually attends fair weather at this season, a stillness perceptible both to eye and ear, and produced, partly by the quiet of the tuneful groves, but quite as much by the absence of those insect myriads which animate the summer beam. This very stillness is exciting, because (our ideas of light and life being always associate) it seems, on a bright day, strange and almost unnatural. Through a silent sunshine of this descrip- tion, we repaired yesterday morning to an oak wood, which is one of our favourite places of resort and research. This wood, till lately, was a sylvan assemblage of most ancient standing, but is now composed almost wholly of comparative upstarts, exulting in their vigorous life over the truncated stumps below them. But even these, the monuments of fallen greatness, substantial in decay, stood not a whit more motionless than the slenderest sapling of the living generation, not a breath being abroad to wave their tops or to stir the brown leaves which had held on, laughing at autumn gales and wintry blasts. A sprinkle of snow, crisp and glittering, slightly veiled the wood tracks, and as we trod them " we heard not a sound," but the brittle gems breaking on the spangled pathway. This was exactly the stillness we have just been noting as an addition (usually) to the effect or mute expression of old Winter's face, when he treats us to its brightest side ; but somehow or another we felt it, on the present occasion, more as a feature wanting. Our spirits were so light, our blood danced so briskly, our heart glowed, like our feet, so warmly, and rose so thankfully to the Great Source of all things calm and bright and beautiful, that we longed for something animate to join us in our homage of en- joyment. The wish was hardly conceived ere it was accom- plished, for on passing beneath a canopy of low interlacing 26 WINTER ON ATS. branches, we suddenly found ourselves making one with a company of Gnats, dancing (though more mutely) quite as merrily as they could possibly have footed it on the balmy air of a summer's eve. Their appearance was welcome to our eyes, not as flowers in May, but as flowers in January, and so we sat down on one of the oaken stumps hard by, to watch their evolutions : mazy and intricate enough, in sooth, they seemed. The "set" upon which we had intruded, was an assemblage of those Tipulidan or long-legged Gnats which have been named Tell-tales, we suppose, because by their presence in winter, they seem to tell a tale of early spring, belied by the bitter east, which often tells us another story when we turn from their sheltered saloon of assembly. In this sense, however, these are not the only tell-tales of their kind, for quite as common, at the same season, are some other parties of aerial dancers, one of which we fell in with soon after we had taken leave of the first. These were tiny sylphs with black bodies and wings of snow-white gauze, and like " choice spirits, black, white, and grey," (for they wore plumes of the latter colour,) they were greeting the still New Year with mirth and revelry, and that over a frozen pool, whose icy presence one would have fancied quite enough for their instant annihilation. But though (warmed by exercise) these merry mates care so little for the cold without, they are glad enough, when occasion serves, to profit by the shelter of our windows. In ours we often watch them, and you, good reader, had better seek for them, unless you would miss the sight of as pretty and elegant a little creature as any one could desire to look at on a fine summer's, much more a winter's, day. We have spoken of the plumes of these winged revellers, black, white, and grey, which dance in the air as merrily as the Quaker's wife in the song ; but here be it observed, that our Gnats' wives, with real quaker-like sobriety, rarely, if ever, dance at all, and never by any accident wear feathers. But stay ! here we are arrived at the end of our dance, nay, GNAT'S LIFE OF BUOYANCY. 27 at the end of our dancers' lives, without having said a word about their beginning. Well, we have nothing for it but to go backwards, jumping over the steps already made, up to the premier pas, our aerial performer's birth and parentage. Now for the beginning of the Gnat's life of Buoyancy, which commences on the water. Man has been believed by the nations of antiquity to have " Learned of the little Nautilus to sail, Spread the thin oar, and catch the rising gale ;" but he might also have taken a first lesson in boat-building from an object common in almost every pond, though, certainly, not so likely to attract attention as the craft of that bold mariner, the little Argonaut. This object is a boat of eggs, not a boat egg-laden ; nor yet that witch's transport, an egg- shell boat, but a buoyant life-boat, curiously constructed of her own eggs by the common Gnat. The boat may be seen, at home and at all hours, within the convenient compass of a basin filled from an adjacent pond. When complete, the boat consists of from 250 to 350 eggs, of which, though each is heavy enough to sink in water, the whole compose a structure perfectly buoyant, so buoyant as to float amidst the most violent agitation. What is yet more wonderful, though hollow, it never fills with water, and even if we push it to the bottom of our mimic pool, it will rise unwetted to the surface. In a few days each of the numerous " lives" within having put on the shape of a grub or Larva, issues from the lower end of its own flask-shaped egg, but the empty shells continuing still attached, the boat remains a boat till reduced by weather to a wreck. Here let us leave it, and follow the fortunes of one of the crew after he has left his cabin, which he quits in rather a singular manner, emerging through its bottom into the water. Happily, however, he is born a swimmer and can take his pleasure in his native element, poising himself near its surface head down- 28 GNAT PUPA. wards, tail upwards. Why chooses he this strange position ? Just for the same reason that we rather prefer, when taking a dabble in the waves, to have our heads above water, for the convenience, namely, of receiving a due supply of air, which the little swimmer in question sucks in through a sort of tube in his tail. This breathing apparatus, as well as the tail itself, serves also for a buoy, and both end in a sort of funnel, com- posed of hairs arranged in a star-like form and anointed with an oil by which they repel water. When tired of suspension near the surface, our little swimmer has only to fold up these divergent hairs, and plump, he sinks down to the bottom. He goes, however, provided with the means of re-ascension, a globule of air which the oil enables him to retain at his funnel's ends ; on re-opening which he again rises whenever the fancy takes him. But yet' a little while, and a new era arrives in the existence of this buoyant creature : buoyant in his first stage of Larva, in his second of Pupa he is buoyant still. Yet, in resemblance, how unlike ! But lately topsy-turvy, his altered body first assumes what we should call its natural position, and he swims, head upwards, because within it there is now contained a different, but equally curious apparatus for inhaling the atmospheric fluid. Seated behind his head, arises a pair of respirators, not very much unlike the aural appendages of an ass, to which they have been compared ; and through these he feeds on air, requiring now no grosser aliment. At his nether extremity there expands a fish-like finny tail by help of which he can either float or strike at pleasure through the water. Thus passes with our buoyant Pupa the space of about a week ; and then another and a more important change comes " o'er the spirit of his dream." While a noon-day sun is warm upon the water, he rises to the surface and above it, elevating both head and shoulders, as if gasping for the new enjoyments which await him. His breast swells, his confining corslet bursts, and the head, all plumed and decorated for a more ON AT IMAGO. 29 brilliant theatre, emerges through the rent, followed by the shoulders and the filmy wings which are to play upon the air. But have a care, my little debutant! thou art yet upon the water ; an unlucky somerset would wet thy still soft and drooping pinions, and render them unfit for flight. Now is thy critical moment hold thee steady lose not thy per- pendicular, or But why fear we for the little mariner ? He who clothes the lily and feeds the sparrow has provided him support in this, his point of peril. The stiff covering of his recent form, from which he is struggling to escape, now serves him as a life-boat. His upright body forms its mast as well as sail, and in the breeze now rippling the water, he is wafted rapidly along. He will assuredly be capsized from press of sail. But see, he has acquired by this time other helps to aid his self-preserving efforts. His slender legs (hitherto hung pendant) now feel for and find the surface t>f the pool. His boat is left behind and, still endowed with one aquatic power, he stands a moment on the water, then rises buoyant, a winged inhabitant of air ! '.4'i't mitTu'u jifuuoto kuj' u|.i nur Oiuiiituuii. -.-/ Aphides of the Oak. Two of the large brown Aphis quercus, with their curious suckers, and another species of the oak with the wood Ant, Formica rufa y in search of honey-dew, magnified. THE WOOD-ANT AND THE APHIDES. N the midst of an oak wood stands a village or scattered group of rustic habitations. These are curiously excavated in the earth, above which rise their dome-like roofs, thatched in a peculiar manner, with pieces of stick and straw, and each is the common abode of a large community of various ranks and orders. In one of these sylvan dwellings there lived, and perhaps lives still, a good sort of body, a female member of the working class, who set a perfect pattern of industry. Often at work, not only from morn till eve, but from eve till dewy morn, she had turned, as it were, the summer into one long day, and seemed to think that she had thereby acquired a ASLEEP AND A WAKE. 31 title to convert the winter, or as much of it as she chose, into one long night. Accordingly, when December arrived, and with it a frost of intense severity, our busy-body shut herself up in her warm underground quarters, and fell into a comfortable dose, and from thence into a slumber, profound as that fabled of the Seven Sleepers. On went the frost, and with it on went the good house-wife's comfortable snooze ; but one day the sharp north-east having whistled his lullaby, his brother, the soft south-west, arose to do duty in his stead. The sun, at the same time, drew aside his fog curtain, and shone out so bright and warm, as to penetrate even to our sleeper's underground chamber. She felt its reviving power, and awoke. She then stept up to the entrance of her dwelling, or, we should rather say, one of them, since it had almost as many as the far-famed residence of John o' Groat. These, however, had been all carefully barred up on the setting in of the frost, so that, all alone, she had to take down one of the barricades she had assisted to erect; and this done, though not without some effort, she was able to take a peep at the outward world, from which she had been so long retired. Presently she bethought her of a certain large family, with whom her own had long been upon the most intimate and social footing, and by whom, indeed, both herself and friends had often been regaled, even when they had gone in a large party to claim hospitality. The question now was how to reach their abode, which was seated under the protection of an old oak pollard at some distance from her own. In summer, nothing could be easier, and, novice as she was in winter travelling, she thought, poor little soul ! deceived by appearances, that she should find it mighty pleasant and clean walking over the snow. And so a few hours before, she might; but now the snow being half melted by the sun, she sank and floundered at every step, besides being ever and anon nearly swept away by tremendous avalanches falling from the laden boughs over head. Pushed on, however, by hunger and her own determined spirit, she arrived at length 32 A WALK IN THE SNOW. within sight of the desired oak tree. A few minutes more brought her under its boughs, and into the very midst of the family she had come to visit. Like her, they had all been brought out by the sunshine, and like her had all been sleeping through the frost, a habit in which they exactly resembled our busy friend and her fellows ; but here all likeness ended, the people of the oak being as lazy a crew as ever slept or ate away existence. Idlers as they were, yet after their late long fast you may be sure they were all busy enough in breaking it; and as their famishing visitor drew near, her hungry eyes were not slow in discerning that young and old, big and little, were hard at work, not with their knives and forks, but with their pipes, which served them instead of either. Not one of the party took the slightest notice of the pitiful presence of our poor dripping wearied traveller, as she stood at an humble distance, and looked round timidly before she ventured, except by looks, to make known her wants. She first tried to recognize among the younger of the party some who might have been her foster-children ; but they were all grown out of knowledge, at all events seemed to have no knowledge of her. From the juveniles she then turned to one who, judging by appearance, might have been " le Pere de la Famille ; " brown-coated, round, sleek, and shining, he had been busiest of the busy with his pipe, which, by the way, was much longer and, as his petitioner soon found, much more pliant than himself. Fairly tired out with its use, he had laid this curious instrument of repletion, not aside, for he was too much attached to it, but out of the way, and now depending from his chin and bent over his portly stomach, it passed between his legs, and turned up like a tail behind. Well, this was the one-tailed Bashaw whom our hungry suppliant at length ventured to accost, though why in preference to others we cannot say, unless it might have been from the unoccupied consequence of his air. She related her pressing need ; but twice told, or told a hundred times, it fell, as is usual with tales of like burthen, upon a heedless THE GOOD SAMARITAN. 33 ear. The little plump brown-coated gentleman coolly brought forward his pipe, and under the starveling's very nose began again to draw in, after his peculiar fashion, the remainder of his unfinished and apparently interminable repast. The short winter's day was nearly at a close, and perishing with hunger, cold, and wet, bitter seemed her end, and soon she fell into a nap which promised to be much longer even than her last, when she was suddenly awoke by a gentle tapping. On opening her eyes, she could just discern the young face of one belonging to the numerous family, all of whom she had reason to believe alike hard-hearted. This little creature had heard and pitied the story of her distress, when she thought she had related it to none but dull cold ears. Now that her elders were again busy with their pipes, the kind-hearted soul crept round to their uninvited guest, to offer her her own supper. The poor destitute creature thankfully received and was wonderfully refreshed by the timely aid. She slept that night in the old tree, and the next day contrived to reach her home. So ends our tale : but we have yet to disclose the name of our industrious, good-natured, yet withal improvident and rather simple little hero. There is a certain busy worker of whom it is declared, that "she provideth her meat in the summer, and gathereth her food in the harvest," for which sagacious proceeding all teachers of morality, from the wise monarch of Israel downwards, have held her up as a bright pattern of industrious forethought the prudent Ant. And now for the way in which these Ant communities pass the winter, and for the neighbours to whom they are accus- tomed to apply in time of need. These have been already glanced at under the guise of fable. In the plain garb of corresponding fact, let us look at them a little more closely, as their doings stand recorded in some right pleasant and vera- cious chronicles of the Formic nations. "Ants," says their historian, (Huber, p. 239,) " usually become torpid during the 34 ANTS FED BY APHIDES. intense cold, but when the season is not severe, the depth of their nest guards them from the effects of frost. They do not lose their activity unless the temperature be reduced to the second degree of Reaumur below freezing point. I have occa- sionally seen them walking upon the snow, engaged in their customary vocations. In so reduced a temperature they would be exposed to the horrors of famine, were they not supplied with food by the Pucerons. By an admirable concurrence of circumstances, which we cannot attribute to accident, these Insects become torpid at exactly the same degree of cold as those to which they are thus useful, and recover from this state also at the same time, so that the Ants always find them when they need them." We see from this that the providing instinct is not bestowed where a substitute is given. When we say the providing instinct is not given, we must limit the observation to the business of storing grain for winter's want. Though they do not this, they sometimes do as much or more. What say you to the habit of keeping and tending infant herds with a view to future use ? At all events, through a prospective instinct, " they will sometimes (says Huber) col- lect the eggs of Aphides, deposit them in their own nests, guard them with the greatest care, till evolved, and then, as we pasture inilch kine, continue to keep an eye over them for the delicious nutriment they afford. Those Ants which do not know how thus to assemble them, are, at least, acquainted with their re- sorts. They follow them to the base of the trees and branches of the shrubs they are used to frequent, and at the beginning of frost pursue along the hedges the paths which lead to their retreat. As soon as the Ants recover from their torpor, in- duced by severe cold, they venture forth to procure their food. The honied aliment, thus collected and swallowed, is on their return home equally distributed among their companions." The Ant figured in our story, and prefigured in our vignette, is one of that large species before spoken of, popularly known by the different names of Pismire, Wood, Hill, and Horse OAK-APHIS. 35 Ant. Their stick and straw-capped cones scattered through the woods, must be familiar to all wood-land walkers. With- out, a mound of confusion, within they are a marvel of arrange- ment. The conical coping which presents itself to our eye, is indeed the roof, but may also be considered as the upper story, or perhaps several, which contain within them various chambers, one in the centre larger and loftier than the rest, with passages of communication, besides others which lead to the exterior of the nest. The outer entrances of these various avenues, at other times open, are carefully barricaded, not only in winter, but in rainy weather, and also of a night. Our villager's " many friends " of the old pollard, are intended expressly, though not with reference to character, for a family of the large brown Oak-Aphis, greatest of its tribe, with a pipe or sucker of prodigious length, which, when not employed in extraction of sweet juices from leaf and branch, is carried under the body, passing upwards like a tail. ,\f looli uol iff ofo ' ' The Tortoise-shell Butterfly, Vanessa urticce. Suspended beneath the parapet of the wall is the chrysalis of the Cabbage butterfly, Pontia brassicce. Above is the hairy caterpillar of the Tiger Moth, Arctia caja. To the right are three caterpillars of the Magpie Moth, Abraxas grossulariata, attached, as if frozen, to the branches. On the lower stems are the cocoon of a Saw Fly, Trichiosoma lucorum, and an old cocoon of the Vapourer Moth, Orgyia antiqua, employed as a winter bed for her eggs. Encircling a twig above the Butter- fly is a bracelet-like cluster of the eggs of the Lackey Moth, Clisiocampa neustria. LIFE IN DEATH. E were loath to begin the year by contemplation of our Insect subjects while buried in a sleep wearing Death's perfect semblance; but we can look at them now, and their dreamless slumber inspires no corresponding dulness, but only curious expectancy ; for they are about to awake, LIFE IN DEATH. 37 and soon their songs of life and liberty, their morning hymn and their evening boom, will be resounding over the bursting hedgerows and the opening flowers. The Bee is still mute ; the Beetle still motionless; the Butterfly (like the bud) still enfolded in its protecting shroud : but they are not the less existent, and to discover where and how, is a curious object of pursuit, and eke a cheerful one, showing how life and pleasure, activity and beauty, lie lurking under a thousand dry and death-like forms, to which they owe their preservation. Our first preserve, and, as already noticed, one of the lest, is our garden, albeit but a very little one. Let us look around, and here on this hedge we discern a something rarely enough seen, although exposed to our view almost every where on every winter's day. Amidst the intricate branches of the bare haw- thorn, stretches forth an arm, distinguished from the rest by a circlet of beads, a many-rowed bead bracelet, as regularly wrought as bracelet ever worn on lady's wrist, or woven of silk and beads by lady's fingers. This piece of natural jewellery is the work of a certain Mother Moth, whose own eggs, set in an indissoluble weather-proof cement, are the living gems of which it is composed. The deceased manufacturer of this ornament, was a female " Lackey," member of a tribe so called on ac- count of the gaudy liveries (blue and red, white and yellow) in which, while caterpillars, they are arrayed. From these bracelet-eggs will come forth with the opening leaves, just in lime to devour them, a new troop of these Lackey varlets, which in due season (about June) will doff their coats of many colours, for the sober chrysalidan-brown, and in July emerge from their Aurelian shrouds and cases, a company of sober-suited light- brown Moths, images of her, their lady mother, the constructor of this bracelet. That we may look into its workmanship a little closer, let us cut it from the hedge, with the branch it compasses, and from which we can slip it like a ring. We find on inspection, that each of the beads or eggs comprising it ; 38 MOTHS' EGGS. is shaped like the arch stones of a bridge, the whole of them being cemented together in like manner, and thus rendered so strong, compact, and impervious, as to preserve unharmed through winter's wet and cold, the embryo lives for whose protection it was intended. On another leafless spray of hawthorn hangs another group of Insect eggs, the embryo progeny of another maternal Moth. These, however, instead of being united, as in the bracelet, with strong cement, are loosely scattered, but by no means carelessly, for they are laid upon an oval silken bed, the warm cocoon, which having, while she was a Chrysalis, served to protect the mother, was converted by the maternal instinct of her mothhood into a winter cradle for her eggs. From these, in the Month of May, will appear a brood of Caterpillars, at first dark and hairy, afterwards black and grey, with bright yellow tufts, and red and yellow spots, and from these, after the usual changes, we shall have a company of Moths called " Vapourers," the females of which are almost wholly des- titute of wings. One of these was the layer of the eggs in this cocoon, which furnishes, therefore, a striking instance of a seeming deficiency of organization being compensated by an instinctive perception. The mother Moth has no wings where- with to travel far in search of a safe asylum for her eggs, and she would seem, for this reason, guided instinctively to employ her own discarded covering as a bed suited to preserve them. Let us seek now for a specimen of insect life (though still it may be only " Life in death") advanced one step beyond its threshold, or from egg to Caterpillar. But without a leaf yet opened for its support, where is the Caterpillar to be found ? Perhaps we must go farther than our little garden to discover it, for as we look about us, not a living thing, or one like it, can we see, except that rogue of a thrush, busy yonder at a currant bush. Suppose we watch him, and see if he may not prove a guide, an indicator to assist us in our search. What MAGPIE CATERPILLARS. 39 is he about ? Plucking and picking at the bare branches, when meanwhile, close beside him, lies a snail, one of his favourite morsels. There goes the quick-eared songster, put to flight even by our stealthy step j but let him go, we shall find out, all the same, the business he's been after. Aye, aye, Sir Thrush, we even thought so, thy large bright eye has been quicker than our own, in discovering, before us, the very game for which we have been hunting. We are not so clever as thou art in detection of life, clothed in the garb of death. On this branch of the currant bush, where thou wast so busy, remains a trio of stiff, stick-like little animals, more like twigs than Caterpillars, and distinguishable only from the branch itself, neither by form nor motion, but slightly by colour, which in- stead of brown, is whitish yellow, besprinkled with black. These are the Caterpillars of the Magpie Moth, numbers of which, so called from their mode of colouring, are to be seen in almost every garden, flying heavily through the twilight of summer's evenings ; and from the eggs of one of them, deposited on this currant branch, came forth, in autumn, the curious spe- cimens of" still life" now before us. In these we have an in- stance, among others, of Caterpillars defended through the winter by a state of torpidity in which they have now continued for many weeks, without eating, and will thus remain till the breath of springhas roused them to activity, and provided employ- ment for their jaws. The power of Caterpillars, also, in resisting cold has been proved by experiment to be very great, scarcely indeed inferior to that of insect eggs. Those of the cabbage, frozen so stiff as to snap like glass, have yet lived and become Butterflies, while others have revived, after chinking like stones when thrown into a glass.* What next have we come to, basking in a ray of wintry sun- shine on a root of dandelion ? It is another Caterpillar, now a very little one, because short of his full growth, not naked, like * Dr. Lister. 40 TIGER-MOTH CATERPILLARS. the tiny sticks of the Magpie, but clothed, d la Russe, in a brown fur jacket. The moment we touch him, he curls up like a hedge-hog, and falls from the plant upon the ground. From this practice he is known to some people by the appellation of a " Devil's ring," though why a creature harmless as a dove should have acquired this misnomer it is hard to say. His proper, though not, in his present state, a much more fitting appellation, is the Caterpillar of the Tiger Moth ; he is now more like a little bear; but bear or tiger, we have now at home a box or cage-full of the like animals, born from the egg in the early part of last October. Instead of attaining in a few weeks to the full measure of their bulk, as is the case with the summer broods of the same Caterpillar, these, like the little individuals just en- countered, have been, since an early stage, quite stationary as to growth, nearly the same as to motion, have kept on the same coats, instead of often changing them, and it is only in mild weather that they eat sparingly of the leaves of dandelion, wherewith it is not easy to supply them. When the latter are entirely nipped by frost or covered by snow, our little winterers subsist as well without them, upon sleep. In this, their nice and altered adaptation to a rigorous season and short supplies, are not the growth and appetite even of these Caterpillars worthy of notice ? With the arrival of April, and a plentiful supply of dock and dandelion green meat, we shall find in our little " Tigers" a proportionate increase of activity and appetite; their skins, as they increase in size, will be frequently cast, and in May, each having attained to the full measure of its growth, will display to great advantage its jerkin of black velvet, ornamented with rows of white studs, from each of which springs a long tuft of gold-brown grey- tipped hairs, forming, en masse, an upper coat of fur. Our Caterpillar will then speedily repay us for the trouble of his keep, by showing how cleverly he can make his cocoon, spinning it of his own silk, interweaving it with SOCIAL CATERPILLARS. 41 hair plucked from his own body, and eking out these natural materials by extraneous ones, such as grains of earth, pieces of leaf, or even bits of paper when placed within his reach. Shut up in this secure asylum he will become a chrysalis, and in two or three weeks, come forth a Tiger Moth complete, a winged creature, glorious in " crimson dyes" and richest brown and cream colour. * ***** Leaving the garden, let us extend our hunt over a wider range, and here, without the paling, we discover, hung upon an oak-tree, another cloak of protection for Caterpillar life amidst the surrounding death of vegetation. We have here no solitary survivors, but a social company, if social we may designate a few dozens of half, or quite, dormant little animals, bidding defiance to Jack Frost from behind the triple tapestry of a silken hammock woven by themselves. This their winter dor- mitory is of shape irregular, with here and there a brown oak- leaf woven into its outward texture, the interior being divided, also with tapestry, into various snug apartments, where the little inmates lie coiled together by twos and threes, till waked into activity by the coming spring. These, at present harmless slumberers, will grow, by and bye, into tremendous ravagersof the oak and other trees, and will then, on the boughs they have stripped bare, be sufficiently discernible in their tufted parure of black, white, and scarlet. These are the progeny of a pretty white moth, yclept the gold-tail, from a tuft of gold-coloured hair at the end of her body. But stay ! What have we here ? A sort of rough excrescence seeming to grow out of the tree, just within the edge of its shell-like trunk. When we come to look at it, it seems not, however, like a vegetable growth, it is the wood-built structure of a Caterpillar, and his present dor- mitory, now that he has cast off his working dress, and put on the monastic habit of an idle chrysalis. Let us look into his cell, or at least on its exterior, a little closer. The fabric is of oval form, composed of pieces of rotten wood 42 PUSS COCOON. and bark, meshed in and kept together by silk and gluten ; the latter renders it so hard, that it refuses to yield under pressure of the finger ; we might perhaps force it, though not without trouble, by aid of stick or knife ; but let us spare it, leaving its ingenious builder and occupant to finish, unmolested, his winter's nap, to sleep on till the merry month of May ; and then, forcing his wooden walls by help, it is said, of an expressly provided acid, to expand his pencilled pinions on the evening air. But it might please you, curious companions of our rambles, to see for yourselves, the pattern of those pretty pinions j and so in due time you shall, for we have at home almost a facsimile of this wood-built cell, constructed under our own eye by a brother artisan, a " Puss" Caterpillar, which, as a chrysalis, now lives within it. Yonder is the wall of a kitchen garden. Just under the coping of the wall, its only shelter, slung in horizontal position, hangs a chrysalis, which by its shape, angular instead of rounded, as well as by the open mode in which it is exhibited, we recognize, at once, as a future Day- flier ; and by the colour, a greenish yellow, besprinkled with black, no less than by its choice of situation, know it to have been, in autumn, a Cabbage Caterpillar, to appear in spring (though not perhaps till May) a large white garden Butterfly. It hangs here attached to the wall by a double support, a silken button at the tail, and a band or loop of threads round the middle of the body, its last pieces of ingenious workmanship while in the Caterpillar form ; and we perceive, also, a thin silken web stretched over a small space of the brick above. This is a preparation of its surface to receive the ends of the supporting girth, which would not else adhere. But look ! What is flitting past us, even now ? In very sooth, a "Devil's Butterfly" has come from the ivy overhead, or a warmer place below, to reproach us for indifference to Butterfly presence, or to upbraid yonder cabbage sleeper for still sleeping on. There ! now she has settled, not on the elder clusters, nor yet on the hazel flowers, but on this leafless hawthorn, and TORTOISE-SHELL BUTTERFLY. 43 here do her " golden pinions ope and close," as if she designed to enhance their living splendour by contrast with the death- like branches. Well! be thou Butterfly of " devil" or of " witch," as our brethren of Scotland are wont to call thee (we suppose for thy winter-braving hardihood), thou art a glorious creature, and thy tamer name of " little Tortoise-shell" does but sorry justice to thy glowing beauty. This "little Tortoise-shell" which, in common with others of her hardy sisterhood, has survived the winter, her radiant robes laid up in ivy or some other close green wardrobe, belongs to the beautiful genus " Vanessa" or Fan-winged Butterflies, which, while in their state of spiny Caterpillars, feed for the most part upon nettles. They are distinguished by their warm rich colours, their angular scalloped wings, with points at the hinder margin, and the shortness of their fore-legs, which do not serve the purpose of walking. '----<-.. ^ : :.-,- -;,-._ vfitt tlu npjmmrt' tUfntti tif tmnter . " - . : ^ 1 An assemblage of two species of Ants, Formica rufa and cunicularia, illus- trating the mode in which the former attacks the latter, and seizes its larvse and pupae. In the foreground is an instance, not uncommon in insects, of an individual retaining its vitality after the loss of its body, and above are a winged male and female of the same species. A MILITARY EXPEDITION, AND A NEW BATTLE OF THE AMAZONS. the midst of various other nations are now dwelling and have dwelt from the year no- body knows what a pigmy people, whom we shall call Form leans, divided into tribes, and long celebrated for their activity, industry, and form of government both civil and military. The custom of slave-making, as still sanctioned by the example of biped nations, has been always practised by certain SLAVES AND SLAVE-HOLDERS. 45 tribes of this pigmy people. In some respects, however, our Lilliputian slave-owners are wofully behind-hand, as compared with those of larger stature. The slaves live as well as their possessors, and on some occasions, the common rule of such relationship being reversed, would seem to take the chief au- thority into their own hands. With all this indulgence, these little slaves are famous hands at labour. No Jack-of-all-trades, nor maid-of-all-work (for be it here observed that they are all females) can beat them for universal usefulness. The greater number of their owners are of the same sex with themselves, and, what may seem on this account the more remarkable is, that they are all without exception soldiers amazonian soldiers. It follows, consequently, that their slaves have everything to do. In a populous city they are, at once, the builders, the scavengers, the porters, and the nurses of the infant population. Nay, they are even the feeders of the grown-up free community, which consists solely of the above-named lady soldiery, a few idle gentlemen, and some two or three queens or princesses of the blood. The slave population being thus absolutely neces- sary to the comfort, nay, very existence of their owners, it of course follows that the keeping up of its numbers is a most important matter. This object is effected by predatory excur- sions, taken frequently into the territories of those harmless unoffending tribes which furnish the desired supply, and from which the female warriors usually return triumphant, each laden with the trophy of an infant captive. On a certain day of a certain year, the Amazonian chieftains of Rufia, one of the slave-making states of Formica, assembled to concert a plan of operation for a new campaign or marauding expedition. It was towards the close of a fine summer's day that the army of the Rufians was seen issuing from their capital. Their march soon brought them to an arid sandy plain, strewn with rocky fragments, between which they pursued their way in winding but unbroken files, their polished brown corselets 46 THE FIGHT. glistening like sparks of fire in the glow of the declining sun. Marching with great rapidity, considering their diminutive stature, they soon traversed this desert-like tract without loss or accident, a matter for no small congratulation, seeing the manifold dangers to which their exposed route had rendered them liable. Onward they pressed, while some of the most ardent of the assailants, leaving the main body behind, rushed forward to attack the enemy's sentinels, who were posted at each of the avenues leading down into the subterranean city. These watchful guards, who presently gave notice of the approaching army, were, like their assailants, all Amazonian soldiers, only of a much milder and more pacific disposition, being used to combine gentle employments with their profes- sion of arms, a profession, moreover, never exercised except defensively. Slavery, as inflicted on others, is a thing unknown among the Fuscans ; and their working females, who constitute the chief bulk of the population, are not only the sole defenders of the state, but also perform all the useful offices, which among the Rufians are made to devolve upon the slaves. Now comes the tug of war. The defenders are assembled in front of their city, fighting for their queen, their lives, and the liberty of their infant population. The assailants, their main body having now come up, are fighting for glory and for plunder, and above all, for the rape of Fuscan babies, to become the future slaves of their own rising generation. Oh ! for a Homer's pen to describe the universal ardour and the individual prowess of our pigmy Amazons. By far more nu- merous are the dusky Fuscans, though in discipline and personal strength they are much inferior to the warlike Rufians. Of the latter we have spoken, hitherto, as Lilliputians, but now we have to treat of them as opposed to a tribe of very inferior stature. The battle-field, an area of some four feet square, is strewed THE FIGHT. 47 with dead and dying. Sulphureous fumes exhale around. Single combatants by thousands, each so eager in their re- spective contests as to seem unconscious of all besides, have spent their ammunition ; but with rancour undiminished, behold them now, limb to limb, head to head, seized by each other and held in savage grip now wrestling upright, now rolling in the dust ; long does the dubious strife continue, till a third, Rufian or Fuscan, comes to turn the balance and throw death into the ascending scale. In another quarter, see perhaps a dozen combatants of either party, all firmly linked together in a living chain, dashing, writhing like a wounded snake in serpentine convulsions, till snap goes a link beneath a mortal blow ; but in an instant the dissevered portions reunite, and struggle on with double fury. Look now at that powerful long-limbed Rufian and the active little Fuscan, her opponent: the latter springs like a cat o' mountain on the chest of her bulkier foe ; but dearly does she pay for her temerity. Caught in the grasp of the Amazonian Ajax, she is crushed and falls strangled to the earth. She falls but let not her conqueror exult a sister heroine, no bigger than herself, and like herself, carrying in a little body a mighty mind, beholds and vows to avenge her fate. She too springs upon the Rufian, but with more effective grasp, her powerful jaws enclosing, as in a vice, one limb of her athletic antagonist. The Rufian severs in twain the body of her assailant ; its lower half falls and is trampled in the dust ; but (horrible to see !) the upper portion still retains its hold, supported by the jaws which death has double-locked. The fixed eyes continue to look up angrily into the living face, the rigid arms to encircle the warm body of the wounded Rufian. Vainly she strives to shake off the hideous burthen : like the old Man of the Mountain, it will not be dislodged j and though the Amazon of Rufia left that battle-field, yet " ever more The lady wore," 48 WARS OF ANTS. carried, perforce, about her, the slaughtered Tuscan's head and shoulders, frightful trophy of her dear-bought victory ! Who can paint the scene that followed? Who can number the innocents that day made captive ? Triumphant was the homeward march of the victorious Rufians, each Amazonian victress shouldering her ravished bant- ling. Of the little captives, some (the pupce) were wrapt in a sort of swaddling-clothes, whilst others (the larvce), who were younger and not thus enthralled, felt equally ill at ease under the awkward handling of their warlike captors. No longer keeping (in consequence, perhaps, of their acquired encum- brances) the regular array, in which, spite of impeding obstacles, they had advanced towards the ransacked city, their return, for the greater portion of the way, was straggling and irregular: but converging from all points, they at last reassembled again in a compact body before their own capital. Thus were the free nurseries of Fusca stripped almost to ex- tinction, that the slave nurseries of Rufia might be replenished to overflowing. ****** The foregoing, like many another historic record of a graver nature, is not, we confess it, exactly true; but the following notes, drawn chiefly from Huber, the veracious chronicler of the Ant nations, will show that our fiction treads very closely on the heeis of fact. The wars of Ants were observed long ago, and one of their battles, fought under the pontificate of Eugenius IV, was honoured by having for its historian tineas Sylvius, who was afterwards Pope himself, as Pius II. The most warlike of the Ant tribes, according to Huber, is the Wood-ant, the largest British species, of which we have elsewhere told a tale with relation to other than its military characteristics. 1 These, as well as its domestic doings, are delightfully described by the above writer, and a walk to some neighbouring wood is almost 1 Supra, p. 74. INSECT ARTILLERY. 49 sure to afford personal acquaintance with these sylvan warriors with the*ir corselets of rusty red, and black head and tail pieces. There also we may see their " fortified cities," their " military roads," diverging from these "citadels" like so many rays from a centre ; their regular battles with the same or a weaker species; their skirmishes, their single combats, their ambus- cades, their barricades, and all the pomp and circumstance of Formican warfare. But though it was known centuries ago that Ants made war, it was not discovered till of late years, and that by Huber himself, that they also made slaves, seizing them while in their infancy (their state of larva or of pupa) to be trained up for their service, by compatriot slaves already grown up in the same. The Wood-ant above mentioned has been frequently de- tected in thus making free with members of its neighbours' infant population, and may probably turn them to the like useful account; but the slave-maker par excellence is a larger brown species, Formica rufescenSj not a native of the free soil of England, though the slave-made F. fusca, or the negro, is. JSc : ^^ -^t ComjiF a&tr ifs limb '.-/.; ON APHIDES. On the rose-buds are numerous Aphides, A. Rosce, of the natural size; in the foreground are individuals of the same, winged and wingless, magnified. In the midst cf some small Aphides on a leaf is the leech-like grub of a Scceva Pyrastri, thinning their numbers, and to the right is a winged Fly, the mature condition of the same. Another species of the genus, Sccuva balteata^ is seen above in different positions on the wing. To the left on a branch of elder, are individuals of the Elder Aphis, A. Sambucaria, beneath which is a magnified representation of the same attended by a Brown Ant, Formica brunnea, pro- curing a supply of honey-dew. UT \vhat sort of insects are Aphides? demands perhaps a reader who is no entomologist. In plain English, they are Plant-lice. But what are Plant-lice? is the question put by another who is no observer of nature. Let us inquire in reply, what is a Wasp, a Spider, a Butterfly ? Did you ever BLIGHT INSECTS. 73 happen to notice one of those remarkable creatures ? Well then, we can tell you that for every single Butterfly, you have seen a thousand Aphides, and for every score of Wasps, a million of Plant-lice. Not only have you seen, but scarcely a summer's day has passed without your having destroyed them by dozens. Your foot annihilates them on the grass. They die by your hand on almost every flower-sprig you gather ; and with every vase of sweets which you place upon your table, you consign them, without a thought, to the bitter death of famine : so important and fatal is the influence which you, and everybody, are continually exercising over the destinies of Aphis existence, little as you would seem to know about it ; although, perhaps, you may be better acquainted with it by sight than you are by name. However blind from indifference to the minutiae of nature, have you not often, when about to pluck a rose-bud or a piece of honeysuckle, almost started to find the one a green mass of moving life, the other with leaves green no longer, but turned black to the eye, and clammy to the touch ? You perceive, in short, that what most people call a " blight," but what naturalists only look on as a swarm of Aphides, has been busy with your flowers before you, and turn away disgusted, to seek for less contaminated sweets. Now suppose we look at the leaf-buds of a rose-bush, which, early as it is, we shall find already occupied by Aphis tenantry, such as have recently emerged from minute black eggs, de- posited last autumn on the branches. These are all green, of small size, and without wings, but later (towards the end of May) a single flower-bud is likely to present us with two or three kinds of these infesting sap-suckers, differing in size, form, and colour. Now for our blight-disfigured rose-bud, which, instead of encasing green and bursting red, displays nothing; but a moving multitude a conglomeration of Plant-lice, .which, taken en masse, is certainly no pleasing object. For all this, the little winged animal which, as being more conspicuous 74 RAVAGES OF APHIDES. than the bulk of its fellows, we shall first single from among them, is no inelegant specimen of nature's Lilliputian work- manship. It has a plump shining body of deep bright green, spotted at the sides with black j long slender legs, inclining to reddish, and, like a bamboo reed, marked at every joint with black or darkest brown. The shoulders, head, and long jointed antennae are also chiefly black, as well as two diverging spikelets proceeding from the back ; while a pair of ample wings, much longer than the body, rise erectly over it. This pretty insect, and those which resemble it, look like the aristocracy of the wingless multitude by which they are sur- rounded; and though we cannot pronounce their pinions to be borne as badges of rank, we believe that no reason has, as yet, been assigned with certainty for the partial distribution among Aphis tribes of the organs of flight, which do not with them, as with various other insects, serve as a distinction either of age or sex. If we examine, now, the wingless multitude the canaille of our rose-bud we shall find that the individuals which compose it have shorter legs and flatter bodies than their winged superiors, and that they differ exceedingly in size from one another. For the most part their colour is a light green, though some are of a pale red ; but however else they differ, all, both winged and wingless, are furnished with one remark- able appendage common to the whole Aphis tribe, to whatever plant peculiar, from the lordly oak to the lowly briar. This is the haustellum, trunk, or sucking-pipe, appended beak-like to the head, and which, consisting of a tube both pointed and perforated, serves the double purpose of piercing the leaf and sucking its juices. The pipes of these our little ravagers of the rose are but as beaklets compared with those of their brethren of the oak ; l yet they form, we can tell you, no despicable instruments of 1 Oak Aphides, (A. quercus). APHIDES, FOOD OF OTHER INSECTS. 75 destruction, employed as they are by thousands in simultaneous and incessant labour. And this considered, who can wonder at the marvellous and unsightly changes, the spoil and havoc, which these peaceful armies carry in their wake. For the most part, these Insect marauders, living to eat and to be eaten, seem to have no other business, no thought or care, except on the matter of supplies, and take no trouble to conceal their ranks from the observation of their numerous enemies, or even to shelter themselves from the stormy wind and rain, which sweep them off by millions. Most of us have heard of honey-dew, and know, probably, that it is a sweet clammy substance, found on the leaves of various trees and plants, especially on the oak, the vine, the hop, and the honeysuckle. As to the real nature of this sweet poison to the plant, opinions differ ; and some, perhaps, even of the learned moderns know as much about it as did the learned ancient, Pliny, who doubted whether to call it " sweat of the heavens," "saliva of the stars," or "a liquid produced by purgation of the air." Careful observation seems, however, to have pretty clearly ascertained that this honey-dew, (like the honey of Bees, of vegetable origin,) is extracted with the sap, secreted, and then thrown out by the Aphides in a state of the greatest purity. Besides the profusion of sweets which they scatter around them, like sugar-plums at a carnival, they always keep a good supply within the green jars of their bodies. By the lavish distribution of these saccharine riches, our little Aphides make for themselves, it is true, a few interested friends, while, on the other hand, they owe to their possession a host of devouring enemies. Reaumur designates the race of Aphides as " the very corn " sown for the use of their more powerful insect brethren ; but as animate creatures, as well as gregarious green-leaf grazers, they have been considered with more propriety, as the oves and boves, the flocks and herds, of those which seem permitted to hold them in possession. Amongst this devouring crew is the 76 APHIDES REARED BY ANTS. beautiful gold-eyed, lace-winged Fly, which, while yet in its crawling minority, roams through its appropriated leafy fold, making tremendous use of its crooked and perforated tusks, first to slaughter, then to suck in the sweet juices of its victims at the rate of two a minute. Of less ferocious aspect, but not a whit less insatiate than the above, is the green or parti- coloured Grub of a Bee-like Fly, called a Syrphus, of which many varieties are common in gardens, darting from flower to flower, or hovering hawk-like over them. Applied closely to a leaf or stalk by their hinder extremities, which are broad and flattish, the Grubs of these Syrphi may, in June, be noticed by dozens, on the stretch for the Aphis prey by which they are usually surrounded. In this attitude they much resemble Leeches, and like Leeches are in greedy search of blood, the honied blood of their victims. But enough of Aphis enemies; and now for the friends, which, as well as foes, they owe to the possession of their honied treasures. We have hitherto seen our flocks of the leaf appropriated as sheep for the slaughter; but those to whom this fact, however new, will appear nothing strange, may smile incredulous, on being told that as " milch kine " they are sometimes kept, tended, and even reared by insect proprietors, for the sake of the sweet milk the honey-dew which they afford. In our history of u Fair-weather Friends," we have already adverted to this patriarchal practice, and have, therefore, only to remind our readers that it is exercised among various tribes of economic Ants, though the Yellow Ant 1 has been termed the greatest cow-keeper of them all. It may require some time and trouble to become witnesses ourselves of this marvellous instance of Formic economy, already proved beyond a doubt by the observations of others; but everybody has an opportunity of noticing that Ants and Aphides are held together by some bond of 1 Formica flava* APPLE-BLIGHT. 77 union. They are continually seen in company, and a little further scrutiny presently discovers that the Ants are the followers of the Aphides, and entirely for what they can get out of them. Last August, the stalks of an elder shrub in our garden were absolutely blackened at the joints by Elder Aphides, and among these were continually to be seen a multi- tude of brown Ants, demanding and receiving their supplies of honey-dew as emitted by the former. Besides the general analogy which exists between flocks of Aphides and flocks of sheep, in their gentle nature, their gre- garious habits, and in their being appropriated so extensively for food, there may be noticed, in several instances, a curious kind of external rapport between them and the woolly-coated quadrupeds. There are some species of Aphides which are actually clothed with a sort of wool or down. One of them, a four-winged Gall insect, 1 is found in June or July on the poplar, or may be often noticed at that season, flying or floating about in the air, like a small white tuft of down. Another hoary-coated Aphis is unfortunately too well known to apple-growers under the name of " White Blight." The branches of those trees selected for their pasture by our insect sheep are soon invested by their numerous fleeces with a hoary aspect, appearing in spring and increasing through the summer. These fleeces are found upon examination to consist of a woolly or cottony sub- stance, exuded from the insects' bodies, and under its cover a multitude of these wingless Aphides are incessantly at work with their destructive pipes, sucking up the sweet vital juices of the tree : the old and the young being thus employed together, parents with their offspring, to whom this soft down serves the purpose of a cradle. There is a peculiarity which distinguishes the Aphis from perhaps every other creature in the animal world, a physical 1 Eriosoma populL 78 GENERATION OF APHIDES. enigma about which the divers into Nature's secrets long puzzled their heads in vain, until at last a clever, patient Frenchman 1 hit upon what is considered its solution. Now, when you see in spring or early summer a group of Aphides, a group of leaves covered with them, or even a group of trees which they have made their own, it is certain (at least we can answer for the fact on good authority), that in all the multitude on which you cast your eye, you will be looking on none but Aphides (whether winged or wingless) of the feminine gender. " Where then are the lords of these numerous ladies?" is a question you very naturally ask. Why, they are not in existence and never have been. The ladies may have had fathers, they have children (to be seen like chickens busy with their bills around them), but with perfect truth, and without a shadow of imputation on their spotless characters, they neither have, nor ever have had husbands. Now suppose all the elderly matrons presiding over this assembly to have gone the way of all flesh of Aphides, and that you are looking on a similar company composed of their imme- diate descendants. Still presenting the same remarkable defi- ciency (if deficiency it be) of masculine members, this assem- blage will consist entirely of the daughters and granddaughters of the defunct ; and as not one of these, though each in her turn is pretty sure to become a mother, can ever boast a son, so it goes on, even to the tenth generation. Suppose, lastly, that in September or October you fall in with another company of Aphides regaling on an autumn rose- branch. If so, prithee, pluck it, and let us scrutinize together the assembly by which it is occupied ; for being probably the tenth or last generation, it is likely to contain, at length, some of the lords of this curious creation. Aye, now we have them ! here, amongst the green "petticoats" are some individuals distinguished by surtouts, some of bright yellow, some of 1 M. Trembley. MALE APHIDES. 79 orange, some of sober brown, colours worn in accordance, it is said, with their youth, middle, or advanced age. All these " Mercuries " wear wings ; but even their pinions assume with equal propriety a corresponding hue, deepening from white to transparent black according to the period of their wearer's standing. Might not our evergreen beaux (for evergreen belles are privileged even by example of feminine Aphides) take a hint from these sensibly clad seniors of the sap-sucking race ? Perhaps, however, it is scarcely fair to quote as patterns in anything such out-of-the-way creatures as those we are describing strangest of animals ! but especially in the paternal character. The Insect race is celebrated for having numerous progenies, but these, our patriarchal pucerons, are far superior to all the rest. They are no fathers of ten in family, nor of twenty, nor of twenty times twenty, but (marvel of multipli- cation !) each of these sires can boast of being the actual parent of ten generations, all, save the last, made up of daughters ! You who doubt whether this is true, or may desire to know how it has been proved, we refer to the scientific pages of Bonnet, Trembley, Richardson, Rennie, and a host of other unimpeachable authorities. mrna muff hi tfie In the centre is the large green Caterpillar of a Moth, feeding on rose petals ; to the -left the Red-tailed or Lapidary Humble Bee, Bombus lapidarius, revelling in pollen, and to the right is the small Cabbage Butterfly, Pontia Rapce; in the suspended case of spirally-rolled leaves is a smaller Caterpillar, and above are two long-horned Japan Moths, Adda De Geerella, communi- cating by antennal language. INSECT SENSES. HIS lovely spring- time has bi-ought round a grand festival -a feast of the Senses, which seated, as sisters, at Nature's bounteous board, are now being specially regaled, each with a " dainty dish " peculiarly suited to her liking. That insects are endowed with senses like our own is now almost universally acknowledged. A child can point to the eyes of a Fly or Bee as readily as to those of an ox ; and though EYES OF INSECTS. 81 the child judges only by analogy of position and of form, dissection and experiment have alike induced the natural philosopher to assign the name and office of eyes to those large, brown, reticulated bodies, which in the said Fly or Drone-bee are seen occupying th,e greater portion of the head. Besides these, the same insects, and most others, are provided with three smaller eyes, termed ocelli, which resemble shining points, and which are usually placed in the form of a triangle, above and between the larger pair. We find, therefore, that, both as respects the size and number of their visual organs, Insects have greatly the advantage over all other animals at present known, amongst which there is not one which can boast of five, much less of eight eyes, or of twenty, the complement bestowed upon the Spider and the Centipede. We are by no means, however, to set it down for granted, on this account, that every insect is a little eagle or Argus in power and quickness of vision ; for their many eyes would sometimes seem to serve them like the hare's " many friends/' or like the many servants by whom we are often worse waited on than by a few. All that we can pronounce on with any certainty is this that the gift of sight, as well as of every other sense conferred on insects, is adequate to the exigences of their nature : for the rest, the closest observers are much at variance. One of the most curious peculiarities observable in insect eyes, in those of them, at least, which are large and conspi- cuous, is their compound construction. Their cornea (or outer coat) instead of being smooth, is numerously divided into what are called facets, each of itself a little perfect eye. Of these, a Butterfly has been assigned, in each compound organ, 17,335 a Dragon Fly, 12,544 a House Fly, 7000. Possessing such a multitude of eyes or eyelets under one, it might seem that of every single object Insects must be pre- sented with a multitude of images. This, however, we have 82 EYES OF INSECTS. no reason to suppose, inasmuch as we, with our pair of single eyes, are not in the habit of seeing double, and as (according to Muller) " each individual facet of an insect's compound eye can survey but a small space in the field of vision, each only contributes to the perception of all things within it. Each separate one does not at the same time see all such objects, but only conveys its impression to the nervous filament with which it is supplied, and the latter being united in the great optic nerve, a common and distinct image is ultimately produced." The compound eye of an insect would not seem, therefore, to multiply objects to its natural possessor, but it has never- theless been converted by the ingenuity of man into a curious optical instrument of multiplying power. Through the eye of a Flea (so placed as to command objects with the assist- ance of a microscope) a single soldier has appeared as at once diminished and multiplied into a Lilliputian army, while the flame of a single candle has been made, in like manner, to represent a grand miniature illumination. The eyes of Butterflies present on examination the ap- pearance of a multiplying glass of this description, the facets bearing a resemblance to a cut diamond. The ocelli or simple eyes, appearing as little points of crystal, seated mostly above the compound pair, and usually three in number, are supposed to be intended, generally as well as in Bees, for the purposes of near vision such as examination of leaves, flowers, &c, serving for food, or presenting it in the smaller "fry" by which they are frequented. The position of Insect eyes is in several cases worthy of especial notice : affording in their variations from the common type, so many remarkable instances of that kind creative care which adapts each organ with exquisite nicety to its intended use. In that little shining Beetle, called the Whirlwig, which may be seen every summer's day whirling about the surface of EYES OF INSECTS. 83 smooth waters, each of the eyes is, as it were, divided into an upper and a lower half: the one for looking up into the air, the other for looking down into the water. Those of the Harvest Spider are seated at the top of the head, of all posi- tions the most convenient for a creature living chiefly among grass or stubble. In a common Spider, the eyes, which are all of the simple kind, are no less excellently calculated by their varied positions, front, top, and side- ways, for commanding that range of sight so useful, especially in the hunting tribes, for perception and seizure of their prey. Of eyelids, Insects, we believe, are wholly destitute, but they are often amply provided with eye-lashes, or with what stands them in the stead of those protective appendages. Their pur- pose in defending the concave surface of the eye from dust and various injuries is supplied by an assemblage of hairs, with which the cornea of Bees and many other Insects is over- spread : the hairs which spring from its reticulate divisions having been likened, when viewed microscopically, to a forest of fir-trees. Linnaaus and other naturalists have doubted whether Insects hear, although, from common observation, as well as from general evidence, their hearing would seem as little a matter of question as their sight. Their aural organs would appear less decidedly ascertained. It is, however, usual to suppose that these are none other than the antenna, those slender flexible appendages, capable of being directed, like the long movable ears of an ass or a hare, to all quarters, for the conveyance of sound. Observations, such as may be multiplied daily by ourselves, have also tended to confirm the above inference founded on analogy. Kirby adduces, among other examples, the common use made by those prying parasites, the Ichneumon Flies, of their long, flexible, ever-moving antennas, which they are accustomed to plunge into the deep nest-holes of the solitary Bees, whose grubs are converted into living receptacles for 84 INSECT HE ART NO. their eggs. Some indeed have conjectured that it may be merely with intent to explore the nest, and feel for her infant victim, that the insidious Ichneumon thus inserts her antennae; but since the holes are always so deep as to prevent the possibility of her thus reaching the grubs, as they live at the bottom, it seems much more probable, in the opinion of the writer in question, that she employs them as ears to detect any sound of eating or moving from the occupant of the nest. Insects are pre-eminently gifted with the sense of smell. No flock of vultures can be directed more unerringly to their re- volting prey by scenting its odours from afar, than are certain Insects, such as Dung-flies and Carrion Beetles, whose corres- ponding office is to assist in ridding the earth of offensive objects. That the sense of smell alone directs the Blow-fly in the deposition of her eggs has been fully proved by the fact of her having, through misguided instinct, been found to lay them on silk wherewith tainted meat has been covered, or upon the ill-odoured Stapelias, a tribe of hot-house plants which in scent greatly resemble it. The Butterfly and Bee, with other winged collectors whose more agreeable business lies among sweet odours, are equally quick scented in their detection at distances almost incredible. From a prodigious height, not less, it has been estimated, than sixteen or twenty feet, the former lights down upon its favourite flower ; while the latter wings its way for miles in the exact direction of flowery fields and thymy downs, from which scented breezes bring them invitation. Even when at hand, it is the odour of flowers rather than their appearance by which both Bees and Butterflies would seem to be enticed ; for it was found by M. Huber, that four Bees and a Butterfly were speedily assembled round some honey which he had placed, for experiment, in a window, concealed by shutters only sufficiently open to admit their passage. Availing themselves of this liking for sweets and perception of their distant and invisible presence, moth collectors are in the habit of anointing the SMELL IN INSECTS. 85 trunks of trees with honey or thick syrup, by which means they attract and capture not a few varieties. Though thus generally admitted to be what the Italians would call most excellent Nasuti, Insects still puzzle us as to what exact part of their enigmatical frames may be con- sidered an olfactory organ. This is a point on which natu- ralists of the highest credit have been so much at issue, that, when we read the opinions of each, and the experimental evidence adduced by each in support of his own, we seem as if we could scarcely arrive, between them, at any nearer conclusion than that Insects must be all nose. By Kirby and Spence they are invested indeed with the nasal appendage corresponding in position, if not always in shape, with the conspicuous proboscis of a man, a monkey, and the other Mammalia. Huber also opined that their organ of smell is seated in the head and near the mouth, at all events in the case of the Bee ; and in proof of his position, he tells us, that, having dipped a fine pencil in oil of turpentine, he approached it carefully to every part of a Bee's head, but without causing the least apparent sensation until approximated to that in question, when the Insect, starting suddenly from the honey on which it was regaling, beat its wings with violence, and would have flown off but for a removal of the offence. On repetition of the experiment the same effect ensued : the angry Bee fanning itself with its wings, as if to blow away the un- welcome odour. The feet of our insect artificers, curiously jointed and often palmed, seem to partake, indeed, of the power, and to perform in some measure the office of our hands ; but in aid of the feet, the antennae and the palpi (four-jointed bodies near the mouth), popularly termed feelers, are also for ever at work to try, touch, and examine. We come now, in the last case, to the important faculty of taste, with which Insects of all classes, and in every region of the earth, whether of propensities herbivorous 86 TASTE IN INSECTS. or carnivorous, are found to be no less exquisitely gifted. Caterpillars are, according to their kind, either general or par- ticular feeders 5 but even the former confine themselves to particular classes of plants, and among the latter are some so exceedingly nice, that (cormorants as they are) they would sooner die of hunger than eat of leaves other than those which furnish their accustomed food. The caterpillars of those beautiful little meadow Butterflies, the " Blues " and the " Coppers," which feed, in their infancy, on the grasses over which they subsequently sport, are wont, we are told, 1 to appropriate, each for its own peculiar fare, one of the various species which are often intermingled in its native meadow, that, most likely, on which, with instinctive foresight and dis- cernment, the parent had deposited her egg. The accuracy of taste conferred upon the Bee has sometimes been called in question, on the ground that this indefatigable gatherer is by no means particular as to the source from whence she collects her honied stores, giving, in that process, more heed, as it would seem, to quantity than quality of material. Yet herein, we may be sure, Mistress Bee knows what she is about, just as well as her insect fellows. She is most likely quite as discriminate as they, in culling for her own appetite and that of her infant charges ; and both, it is probable, would come but poorly off were her collections confined to those particular flowers or districts, which, in our opinion, supply honey of the finest flavour, though not, of necessity, that most grateful to the palate of a Bee. Again, both Bees and Butterflies are well known to be any- thing but what we call nice in the choice of water the dirty puddle, or even dunghill pool, being, to all appearances, as acceptable to their palates as the sparkling rivulet or pearly dew-drop ; but then, it is said, that Bees only drink from these fountains of impurity in early spring, and, as it is supposed, 1 Rerinie, Insect Miscellanies. TASTE IN INSECTS. 87 for the sake of the salts which they contain, and which they imbibe, it is further concluded, for a like purpose to that wherewith we, lovers in general of sweets, are accustomed to take spring-doses of saline and other unpalatable flavours. With regard to the particular organ whereby the taste of Insects is chiefly exercised, both analogy and observation point to the mouth and tongue. In Dragon-flies, Grasshoppers, and Crickets, this little member is rounded, and somewhat resembling that of quadrupeds ; in others, its shape is curiously varied; in the Wasp, forked like a serpent's; in Saw-flies, triply divided ; in Bees, long and tubular ; in Bugs, awl-shaped and sharp ; but in all, as has been proved by recent discovery, the organs of taste and digestion are moistened and kept in order by a due supply of saliva from pipes opening sometimes into the mouth, sometimes into the gullet, and sometimes into the stomach, as may be most suitable for the purposes of digestion, and according to the greater or less solidity of food. . 'e inissuwfl nrf mt rfsscb ltr In the centre is the common Humble Bee, Bonibus terrestris, collecting pol- len from the Palm-willow ; to the right is a large female Wasp, Vespa vul- garis, a winter survivor and foundress of a new colony, rasping wood as material for her nest, and to the left is another individual of the same, in flight, descending to the bank in which she has formed her burrow. A DEFENCE OF WASPS. HE month of Mars has been unusually pacific, and " Our Lady's Day " has brought us, in consequence, a thicker sprinkling than usual of early spring flowers. See the glories of the palm-willow, already rich in the gold and silver of her flowery catkins. This willow's wealth would seem, however, like other riches, to have had its attractions for the spoiler, for here is a host of Insect plunderers finally awakened from their winter torpor, and brought from far by A WASP IN MARCH. 89 the honied perfume which fills the air. Yet, truly, these are no plunderers ; they are the labourers of the hive. We ask your pardon, little types and patterns of industry, and are right glad to see you on the wing. Load your thigh-panniers as you please with golden treasure, you are no pilferers, for you take without despoiling, and you rob for us. But stay, what have we here ? an idler among labourers ! a highwayman among travellers ! a Wasp among Bees ! A Wasp in March ! Yes, truly, and a Wasp of Wasps ; a very Robin Hood of plunderers, in comparison with whom the last of his pilfering fraternity, seen in autumn on the last peach, was but a Little John indeed. Let us watch his proceedings. Is he going, a la coutume, to attack the Bees, or, contrary to custom, the flowers only ? Neither ; for scornfully passing over both, he has alighted on this old post beside the willow, and there he stays; by turns walking, and standing, and shaking his wings. Now, he seems to be engaged about something, but what nobody can tell, unless he is biting and gnawing the wood for very idleness ; or perhaps (waspish fellow as he is), for very ill-humour at seeing the Bees so happy and so busy around him. There ! he has left the post, and flown down to the bank- side ; and now, all at once, he has disappeared within a hole, the hybernaculum, we fancy, of some field-mouse, into which he has entered without even the common civility of asking permission. What business is he after? some mischief or another, that's certain, for whenever yet was Wasp or vagrant intent on good ? always poking his nose, now into this cranny, now into that, peering here and prying there. Well ! there's not an atom of his great golden-winged body to be discerned within the tunnel; so there's certainly no seeing what he is about, and he will not tell us if we wait for his return ; besides, a cloud has passed over the sun ; the Bees have all gone off, some with panniers only half-loaded, as if expecting an April 90 A WIDOWED HEROINE. shower before its time; and perhaps we shall be prudent to take their warning and go home too. Here we are, again seated by our own fire, such as is always agreeable on an overcast afternoon in early spring; and we are, consequently, in pleasant mood, disposed to be in good humour with, and do justice to, all; with propor- tionate desire to atone for word or deed of unfairness com- mitted towards the meanest creature. Now some such debt of compensation do we owe to that gigantic Wasp, met with in our morning walk, and left, just now, exploring the mouse-hole tunnel. We have been employing, it is true, the last half-hour in recording, with the utmost accuracy, those of its proceedings which met the eye ; but then we have hinted at its purposes, only in accordance with the common and prejudiced notion that Wasps are always after mischief, while we were all the while perfectly aware that our Wasp was bent upon an enterprise, which, however fraught to us with incipient evil, was in itself highly laudable, and worthy, not of an idler or a freebooter, but of a perfect hero, or, more properly, heroine : this great individual being, in fact, of the female sex. Now suppose a certain princess, perhaps but recently a bride, to have seen her husband and her servants fall successively around her, the victims of some sweeping pestilence, followed by an earthquake. From a violent paroxysm, she herself sinks into a stupor of grief, from which she awakes to find herself alone. Though it would be easier to die, she must live and bestir herself, not for her own sake, but to uphold the honour of her princely house, which can only, indeed, be preserved from utter extinction by the preservation of the posthumous heir, which she is likely to bring, soon, into his desolate in- heritance. In earnest, therefore, does she arouse her energies, and so much to the purpose are they employed, that she succeeds, at length, by dint of individual exertion, in founding a new city and a new empire, which, peopled by her descend- WASP COLONIZATION. 91 ants, becomes fully equal to those of whose ruins she was the survivor. Of a widowed princess, playing such a part, it would be said that she was a pattern heroine: and we must now advance the claims of a widowed Wasp to a title some- what similar, for the performance of a like extraordinary achievement. It is commonly known, we believe, that the race of Wasps, in general, " Falls as the leaves do, and dies in October." Such, in fact, is the case with the numerous herd of working, or, as we generally call them, thieving Wasps, with the males (a quiet stay-at-home class with which we have little personal acquaintance), and with a portion of the females ; but of the latter, which are several times the size of the others, a few winter survivors are always left in every nest. These (of which our bulky visitant to the mouse-hole was one), after a season of torpidity, awake in early spring ; when each taking her own separate beat, chooses a favourable site for a new nest. Of this she is the architect, and at this she works, wholly unassisted, until the eggs, which she takes care to deposit in its first cells, furnish her with assistants in the building and peopling of her colony. From the female and the male come we now (last not least) to what has been called the Wasp neuter, that correspondent with the worker Bee and worker Ant, wherein the best qualities of both sexes, the tenderness and patience of the one, and the bravery and activity of the other, seem to meet on neutral ground ; be it noted, however, that this neutral ground, so rich in every quality but that of productiveness, is, in fact, female. Bees as well as Wasps are sometimes robbers, and of a much worse description, because they rob their brethren. It is not unfrequent, we are told, for the inhabitants of a distressed hive to turn marauders, under the name of Corsair-bees. These 92 . COURAGE OF WASPS. not only attack, in a body, more prosperous communities, but, like highway robbers, will lie in wait, by parties of three arid four, for any unfortunate single Bee returning alone and laden to its hive. " One seizes it by a leg, another by a wing, or perhaps there are two on each side confining or pulling its limbs, while they maul and pummel its chest, and bite its head. This maltreatment obliges it to disgorge its honey, which the robbers eagerly lap till they are satisfied, and then let their prisoner go." 1 The Wasps are above such mean and cowardly proceedings : we never heard, at least, of their turning, under any extremity, robbers of their kind; and therefore, socially considered, they are no robbers at all. Then, for courage, a Wasp is scarcely to be equalled. A single one will venture, it is said, to face a whole hive of Bees after a booty of honey, and is, in fair combat, a match for any three inhabitants of the apiary. The same character of boldness accompanies, and, in our opinion, helps to redeem the depredations of the Wasp as exercised upon ourselves. Both Reaumur and the younger Huber studied the domes:ic economy of the common Wasp, as they did that of Bees, by means of glass hives. In this they were greatly assisted by the extreme affection of Wasps for their young; for though the nest be carried off, cut in various directions, and exposed to the light, they never abandon it, or relax in their attention to their progeny. No less admirable than the affection thus testified is their ingenuity displayed, under the same circum- stances of distress, in repairing the breaches of their habitation, removing its ruins, and fixing it to the glass by columns of support. Operations such as these, suggested by, and adapted to, unlocked for exigencies, savour certainly of something beyond the limited powers of instinct ; and an anecdote related of the Wasp, by Dr. Darwin, exemplifies yet more strongly 1 Kirby and Spence. ANECDOTE OF A WASP. 93 its capacity of adapting means to ends. 1 The doctor saw, on his gravel walk, a Wasp with a Fly nearly as big as itself. Kneeling down, he distinctly observed it cut off the head and abdomen of its prey, and then, taking up the trunk to which the wings remained attached, fly away ; but a breeze of wind acting upon the wings of the Fly, turned round the Wasp with its burthen, and impeded its progress. Upon this, it again alighted, sawed off first one wing, and then the other, and having thus removed the cause of its embarrassment flew off with its booty. In the above instance the Wasp seemed to have omitted a part of its usual operation on the bodies of captured Flies, all the wings of which we have several times seen them thus dexterously cut off. Let us now return to the hole in the bank and the giantess of her kind who disappeared within it. At her business there we may now make a tolerable guess, namely, that, as survivor of an old house, and sole foundress of a new one, she was employed in laying its foundations, having availed herself, as is not uncommonly the case, of the previous labours of a mouse, to save her own, in the preparatory business of excavation. This subterranean area being found or formed, her next operation is to lay within it the foundations or walls of her intended city. For this purpose, earth is a material which will not serve her turn, and the nature of that which she employs was long a puzzle. The substance of which the walls and cells of a vespiary are constructed is now, however, ascertained to be none other than paper formed of wood-raspings, mixed with a sort of size, worked to a paste, and subsequently spread into sheets by the Insect fabricator. We have continually noticed, and any one in summer-time may do the same, a Wasp busily at work with its jaws upon an old paling or window frame. Now, many may suppose that there is little in this worthy of observation ; but simply from notice of this trifling and common circumstance did Reaumur 1 Quoted by Kirby and Spence. 94 STRUCTURE OF WASPS 9 NESTS. discover the Wasp to be a paper-maker, and was enabled to trace the subsequent processes of her manufacture. The foundress, whom we saw this morning, had been occu- pied, while settled on the post, in the first or wood-rasping process of her fabrication; and on entering the hole, she no doubt carried with her a bundle of fibres to be kneaded into paper-paste. Then, supposing that the nest was in an early stage of progress, she would proceed to spread a covering of this substance over the first few cells of her incipient home, ' strengthening the same with repeated layers. Her next pro- ceedings have been thus described : l " She now begins to build the first terrace of her city, which she suspends horizon- tally, and not, like the combs of a Beehive, in a perpendicular position. The suspension of which we speak is light and elegant compared with the more heavy union of the Hive-bee's combs. It is, in fact, a hanging floor or terrace, immovably secured by rods of similar material with the roof, but rather stronger. The terrace itself is circular, and composed of an immense number of cells made of the paper already described, and almost of the same size and form as those of a honey-comb, each being a perfect hexagon." These cells, however, are never used as Honey-pots by Wasps as they are by Bees, for Wasps make no honey, and the cells are wholly appropriated to rearing the young. When the foundress Wasp has completed a certain number of cells, and deposited eggs in them, she soon intermits her building operations in order to procure food for the young grubs, which now require all her care. In a few weeks these become perfect Wasps, and lend their assistance in the extension of the edifice, enlarging the original coping of the foundress by side walls, and forming another platform of cells, suspended to the first by columns, as that had been sus- pended to the ceiling. By the end of summer, this city of hanging terraces is completed, and the descendants of the ori- ginal foundress, according to the calculation of Reaumur, may amount to 30,000 in one year. J Insect Architecture, p. 76. THEIR DEPOPULATION. 95 Scarcely has the nest arrived at completion, through the labours of the youngest generation of its inhabitants, when the early frosts of autumn slightly thin their numbers ; their active liinbs and wings begin to stiffen ; their vital juices to grow sluggish ; their bold spirits to grow tame ; their supplies, and their energies to seek them, fail both together. When Novem- ber conies, the Wasp population is cut off as by a pestilence ; of those abroad, some fall far from their habitation, others crawl back to die ; while those at home, lately so busy in the works of building, repairing, or keeping in order, are now sluggishly inactive. In a little while the city of terraces becomes a city of the dead; its sole surviving dwellers, and they, happily buried in torpor, are some two or three of the widowed females (such as the one seen at work this morning), on whom depends the perpetuation of the race. No sooner does the early spring awake them, than (like her) they depart, each on her way, to found another city. Our defence is concluded. Can a Wasp-hater remain among its readers ? uuiiiVr-suruhitfr - *'\ ' ,- - (*;.* Two workers and a Drone of the domestic Bee, Apis mellifica, gathering honey from the nectar-yielding Broom and Wild Thyme, with the Queen Bee above and in the distance, as conductor of a swarm. BEES AS A BODY POLITIC. E must now treat of Bees as a body politic. Insect societies, such as those of Bees, Wasps, Ants, and White Ants or Termites, are things sui generis, standing by them- selves ; they present natural pictures to which, throughout the animal kingdom, no pendants are to be found : and it is this which makes them doubly interesting. A well-peopled hive consists of one queen, several hundred males or drones, and many thousand workers, the latter of which are all imperfect females, though bearing no resem- INSECT SOCIETIES. 97 blance, either in size or habits, to the pampered individual who nominally fills the throne, and actually fills the hive by supply- ing its abundant population. The royal female to whom this endowment of surpassing productiveness forms the very charter of her authority, the very bond by which she holds the hearts of her devoted sub- jects, derives from character but slender claims on their respect. During the entire period of her life and reign, which is gen- erally estimated at about two or three years, she performs not a single labour for the good of the community, save that of increasing its numbers; and her bulky body is seldom roused from its wonted state of luxurious indolence, except when her royal spirit is chafed by vindictive jealousy. The queen of the hive, born, like the queens of earth, no better than her meaner sisterhood, like them, issues from the egg a helpless grub ; but the chamber of her birth, as compared with theirs, is of right royal dimensions, vertical in position, and of cylindric instead of octagonal form. Ample room is thus afforded for the full expansion and development of all her members, as she progresses towards maturity ; while, to hasten and improve her growth, the food supplied her by her assi- duous nurses and future subjects is of the most nutritious and delicate description; not the simple Bee-bread composed of common pollen, and considered good enough for common Bee- infancy, but a rare and curious preparation nicely concocted from flowery juices, and, as reserved expressly for royal nutriment, called by Bee-farmers, "royal jelly." Thus spa- ciously lodged and delicately fed, the favoured grub, when arrived at full growth, spins within her cell a silken shroud ; therein changes to a nymph or pupa ; and thence, in due time, issues forth in all her dignity of majestic size, in all the re- splendency of her golden-ringed body-suit, the more conspi- cuous for the scantiness of her gauze drapery, those filmy wings in which alone her outward gifts, instead of surpassing, are inferior to those of her subjects. 98 WORKING BEES. The baby Bee, destined to become a Bee-labourer, finds herself, on emerging from the egg, an inhabitant of one of those common six-sided cells, which (as it would appear) is so proportioned as in some measure to limit her growth, and thus prevent her from attaining her full development. To this outward restriction is superadded an inward check in the quality of the food administered by her nurses. In lieu of the royal jelly, that stimulating and nutritious extract prepared only for the queen, her infancy is supported on the simple fare of Bee-bread. Our worker comes forth, mature in all Apian excellence, modest in habits, a nun among Insects, and a very " sister of charity " among her fellows. Thus much for the queen and commonalty, the females of the hive ; and now for the three or four hundred of the oppo- site sex, who, as partakers of the royal favour, or as candidates for the same, as well as for their worthless qualities, may fairly be compared to the aristocracy of a state, where birth, not worth, makes the man. We need not describe the Drone, whether of a biped or of a Bee community, since the one is a pattern of, and lends name to, the other. The chief difference between them is this, that biped Drones are to be seen every day of the year, while Bee-drones are to be only seen, because they are only allowed to exist, during those days of summer which intervene betwixt April and August. And truly, living, as they do, to eat, a quarter's span of luxurious existence, at the expense of those who only eat to live, is a tolerably fair proportion. Such at least would seem to be the opinion of the workers of the hive ; for the queen, having meanwhile chosen a royal partner, or partners, from among them, the w r hole three or four hundred fall by a general massacre, towards the end of July or early in August. Have those by whom Bee economy has been held up for human imitation ever thought about the awful consequences which would be involved in even a partial copy of the above severely wholesome policy ? DRONE BEES. 90 Let us suppose ourselves, one moonlight evening in May, taking a garden stroll beside a range of Bee-hives. Instead of the nightly stillness which is wont in Bee cities to succeed the daily hum, there arises from one of these a loud uneasy murmur, which instead of lessening, continues to increase with the lateness of the hour. Our hive is not of glass, but if it were, the restlessness thus audible without would become apparent within, by the evidences of crowding, confusion, and jostling, by all the tokens, in short, usually attendant on some grand event in expectation. From so violent a ferment of vitality something must of necessity arise ; but through the livelong night nothing comes of it, and the morning sun rises on nothing but the same scene and sound of agitated turmoil. From tokens such as these an ordinary keeper of Bees would merely surmise that a swarm was coming, and an old- fashioned village dame would be sure by this time to be getting in readiness her frying-pan and iron ladle, to bring the parting colony to their new abode. Mid-day now approaches, and the body of emigrants rush forth, headed, or, it may be, followed by their sovereign lady. These, however, we mean not to accompany even to the adja- cent bough on which they have settled, most likely for a tem- porary rest, because we shall see better by keeping to the parent hive, the effect of the loss of its queen with a large proportion of its population. Row upon row of hexagonal houses hang suspended in clusters from a common roof. Most of them are occupied, some as store-houses for honey and Bee-bread, others as nurseries for Bee-infancy, and, where not otherwise engaged, as dormitories for Bee-labourers, who, with heads and shoul- ders ensconced within their cells, are accustomed, at intervals, thus to turn their backs on labour, and recruit for fresh exertions. But few enough are the slumberers now taking their repose; the grand event of the morning has raised a general commotion by no means subsided with the absence of its immediate cause; from which mighty effects are yet about to spring. 100 BEES SWARMING. In consequence of the departure of their reigning monarch and queen mother, our amazonian citizens are, for the present, queenless. What a predicament for a people whose very spring of action is set in motion, as we have seen, by loyalty ; but it is an exigence to meet which they are well provided. Among the common six-sided cells which compose the mass of building are perceived some half-dozen oval structures, of more than thrice their size, which are occupied as abodes of growing royalty; and within these waxen palaces have been for some weeks nurtured, in different stages of progression towards maturity, as many young princesses, for one of which the vacant throne is destined. For which of them ? is the question which priority of birth and emergement from one of the cells of state is now to settle; for, at present, all these quiescent candidates for sovereignty are swathed in the silken shrouds of their second or chrysalis stage of being, that wherein Bees are designated by the name of Nymphs. With heads turned towards the royal apartments, the queenless sub- jects anxiously await the moment which is to supply their craving for a sovereign. They wait long, but at length (most welcome spectacle !) a royal lady, perfect in the maturity of her full proportions, issues from one of the royal chambers. A loud and joyful hum proclaims her queen, and her subjects are crowding round to pay their ready homage when, lo ! from another of the state apartments, arrived, like herself, at Bee's and queen's estate, and nearly at the self-same moment, comes forth a second claimant to the regal honours. The rivals catch a glimpse of each other, exchange a glance of angry defiance, then, while the crowd falls back to permit their meeting, rush like she-dragons on one another. Head to head, chest to chest, they strive and grapple, and each has only (in dragon sort) to bend her tail, and fix her venomed dart, and both will fall victims to each other's stings. But, no ! at this moment, as if seized simultaneously with panic fear, they part and recede from the deadly and too equal strife. THE RIVAL QUEENS. 101 The spectators have hitherto been looking on, inactive, though not mute, having kept up a ceaseless hum; but now that the royal combatants give way and separate, that hum increases to a perfect uproar, and a few individuals, darting from the crowd, dare to seize upon the retreating queens and stay their flight, to hang, even, on their "recreant limbs," and hold them back from further retreat, as well as from ad- vance. But, see ! as if their failing spirits were chafed into new fury by the indignity thus offered, they burst from their subjects' hold, and rush back to the encounter. Again the issue hangs suspended, but not for long; for now, one of the queenly combatants, more powerful or more skilful than her rival, rises above her, seizes one of her scanty wings, and inflicts on her undefended body a mortal sting. She with- draws her barbed weapon, while her wounded competitor falls down drags her huge length along then struggles and expires. The conqueror's victory is complete ; and now surely she will rest proudly satisfied with her success in fair and equal combat. But what does she next? What means she by approaching rapidly to the nearest of the royal chambers, where still sleeps, unconscious, one of the four remaining nymphs of royal breeding? With vindictive fury she tears from its entrance the silken tapestry by which it is partially defended, and now she thrusts into the aperture her poisoned dart, and inflicts on the helpless occupant a fatal \vound. Her thirst for rival blood still rages unabated : another hapless nymph, and yet another dies for its assuagement; and she ceases not from the work of murder until her victims and her strength fail together. While the ferocious queen is thus employed, what is the behaviour of her surrounding subjects? Do they submit tamely to the extinction of the royal race? Yes, and they do more; for though they themselves lay not a sting on the sacred persons of the young princesses, they aid the cruel 102 A BEE TRAGEDY. queen in the completion of her butchery ; for no sooner does she quit each scene of her successive assassinations, than drag- ging from the chamber the body she has left, they hasten to hide from view the evidence of her jealous fury. It seems quite essential to the welfare of a hive to acknow- ledge only one sovereign ; but as on this single sovereign, in her capacity of general mother, not only the welfare but the very existence of the state depends ; and as over and above, no emigration can take place without a queen to accompany the swarm, a surplus number of royal nymphs is no less re- quisite to meet contingencies. It will sometimes, however, happen that, notwithstanding such provision, a hive is unex- pectedly bereft of its sovereign, when no successor is existing to supply her place. How then do the people act? Why, for lack of a queen ready-made, they make one. For the space of several hours grief and- consternation reign in place of the defunct sovereign. Then do the murmuring, but not despairing mourners bestir themselves to supply her place. But how are they to do it? Can they mould from their ready material wax, a royal effigy, and then breathe life into the image ? Not so ; but they can resort, for the supply of their exigence, to an expedient almost as miraculous. Let us watch their proceedings in the creation of a queen. Why, this work appears only a labour of destruction ! Surely they are bereft not only of their sovereign, but also of their senses ; and, in a fit of frenzy, are making havoc in the streets of this well-ordered city ! Several parties are here and there attacking the six-sided houses, hastily pulling down their waxen walls, regardless of the young which lie cradled within. Out of perhaps four or five of these unhappy nurslings, all but one are sacrificed by those who had heretofore been their careful nurses; but for this one, still in its infant or grub estate, a changed and brilliant destiny is in store. The first process of her manufacture is begun already by the destruction going on around her. Her narrow lodging, by BEE QUEEN-MAKING. 103 the sacrifice of those adjacent, is converted into a spacious chamber allowing full scope for her bodily expansion; and soon will numerous nurses be busy, cramming her with that nutritious stimulating substance called "royal jelly." Then in due season, in ten days or thereabouts, out will come an artificial sovereign, in all respects as good as ever issued from a royal egg. The above curious process of conversion, though supposed to have been known to the ancients, was first published by Schirach (a French naturalist) in his history of " La Reine des Abeilles." Although the fact was ascertained by careful ex- periment, its assertors were for a long time laughed at, and even abused, in one case, by an opponent who, though he saw nothing incredible in the conversion of plants into animals, deemed it the height of absurdity that the nature of an animal should admit of change. 1 1 Needham, Insect Manufacture, p. 313. l : il , V : ' :- - V''v^ VX V '.'''/ **w. ' V i, ('' -: 7- / 'llu-uinf: l'.H-nt\-:;:'.(ir of tti: -Aksum-i On the left side of the vignette is the Lackey Moth, Clisiocampa neustria, on the right the Gold Tail Moth, Porthesia chrysorrhcea, beneath each of which are their respective Caterpillars, and in the centre is an Oak leaf with a file of infant Caterpillars of the latter species engaged in stripping it of its verdure. Over this hang suspended numerous chrysalides of the black and yellow Ermine Moth, Yponomeuta padella, and above all, in flight, is the small Green Oak Moth, Tortrix viridana., with its Caterpillar engaged in its ravages as a leaf-roller. From one of these scrolls protrudes the empty shell of its chry- salis, and behind this are the remains of leaves which it has reduced to skeletons. MOTHS AS DESTRUCTIVES. Si) HE grand army of Moth-destructives is now in all the activity of a spring campaign. According to their local distribution, these may be considered as attacking us under four principal divisions. One of them is employed on what we may call the out-works, our fields and forest-trees ; a GOLD-TAIL MOTHS. 105 second, coming nearer, spoliates on our gardens ; a third, more darinf, invades our granaries ; while a fourth, boldest of all, attacks the citadel, and makes havoc in our houses. To begin with the first division of our numerous army. Among the most formidable invaders of the oak are certain caterpillar broods, whose earliest infant steps are accustomed to be taken over the surface of a leaf, which they traverse in marching order. Our youthful invaders of the forest are not strong enough to brave an inclement season without shelter. No sooner, there- fore, do the changing hues of autumn begin to threaten them with failure of their supplies, than with instinctive foresight they begin to prepare cantonments for the winter ; and long before the arrival of November we may behold our oak-leaf companies snugly housed in branch-suspended barracks, con- sisting of hammocks spun by themselves of thickly- woven silk. Yet awhile, perhaps towards the beginning of July, and we pass beneath some ill-fated oak-tree on which the legion has been actively engaged. Where, now, proud monarch of the \voods, are thy verdant honours ? Where that crown of royalty, which, when other leafy coronets are falling around thee, is wont to be only gilded by the suns of autumn, and still held fast, often glows the richer even for the blasts of winter ? That diadem has been stripped from thy brow by a vile caterpillar crew. But where are the destroyers? These ruthless ravagers are nowhere to be seen. But what have we here, resting on the shady side of an oak's spoliated trunk ? A little creature of surpassing elegance and beauty; her body seems clothed in a garment of softest swan's down, trimmed at the bottom by a flounce of golden fur ; her ample wings of the same unsullied hue, but of more satiny appearance, are bordered by a corresponding fringe; and even her delicate feet are furred or feathered with white nearly to her toes. Her full black eyes, though lacking lustre, do not lack beauty; and rising from her head, in graceful curves, a pair of snow-white plumes, 106 GOLD-TAIL CATERPILLARS. complete her simple, but most elegant attire. We might almost fancy, as we look at this most delicate of creatures, that we had surprised by day-light one of the fairy elves, fabled to hold their moonlight revels beneath the oak. And truly she is not more beautiful than innocent : a drop of honey-dew is the coarsest nutriment her frame requires, if even air suffice not to support it. But what has she in common, or what has she to do, with the greedy ruthless strippers of the noble tree she rests on? Everything. She has (with them) a common origin: she is the Gold-tail moth, and they were the Gold-tail cater- pillars, of which she once was one, and of a brood of which she will most likely become the parent. There remains but little more to be said, en naturaliste, descriptive of the Gold-tail, either in its form of destruction or of beauty. In the former, however, that of caterpillar, we shall describe its " black and scarlet uniform " with somewhat more precision, and for a reason which will presently appear. Its body-coat of black velvet is enlivened by two stripes of brilliant scarlet down the middle of the back, a row of white, resembling embroidery, running along each side ; and again below these, two other scarlet lines. The head and six-clawed feet are shining black, the hinder and intermediate legs yellowish, and the whole body beset with tufts of gold-brown hair. Leaving wood and hedge-row, let us in May, or even in April, walkthrough the garden, and observe in what manner the second division of our destroying army may be there em- ployed. Have these intrusive devourers shown more respect to the queen of flowers, than to the monarch of the woods ? Not a whit ; and see here the proof ! On almost every rose- bud is a bundle of young leaflets, all drawn from their propriety, and, contrary to their own expansive inclination, bound together, usually in a fan-like form, by means of a silken tie. If we pull asunder the leaves thus unwillingly united, we shall find, living within and upon them, the agent of their union, a ROSE-LEAF ROLLER. 107 little brown black-headed caterpillar. 1 Secure from wind and weather, this little imp here feasts at leisure, and nips in the bud many an infant rose, whose cradling leaflets, intended for its own protection, only serve to conceal the proceedings of its destroyer. Turning from rose to lilac, we find numbers of its leaves rolled up, both cross and lengthwise, their return to a natural position being prevented by silken stays or braces. These are the rollings and weavings of a caterpillar, 2 which in due season will become, as its mother was before it, a small chocolate- coloured moth, like others, a provident parent, who took good care to lay her eggs on the leaf best suited for the exercise of her offspring's ingenuity and appetite. The hop-vine and the burdock are sometimes seen to droop their leaves and stalks without any apparent cause. The rational might suppose them fainting under the influence of summer heat ; the ignorant imagine them struck by what they call a blight ; the fanciful would have declared, in days of greater superstition, that they had been exposed to some " evil eye " of ghost, or witch, or goblin ; and, as it happens, a ghost is really at the bottom of the mystery, for a Ghost Moth? in its caterpillar shape, is gnawing, unseen, at the root of the insect-haunted plant. Quitting the garden for the homestead and the house, we now come to the third and fourth divisions of our consuming host, the domestic invaders of our granaries, garments, and good-nature. These belong chiefly to a family of tiny Moths, called Tine,itmomv.:r rntcrplTi-rs, ot : liip rrufl Seated on the stripped willow-branch to the left is the grotesque caterpillar of the Puss Moss (Cerura vinula), the Moth itself being figured beneath. Below appears the singular masked larva of a Dragon-Fly. The centre of the foreground is occupied by a Dor or Clock Beetle (Geotrupes stercorarius). To the right appear the head and shoulders of another common insect of the same order the Oil Beetle (Proscarabceus) ; and above and between these, with wings extended, is a Devil's Coach-horse, or Rove Beetle (Staphylinus olens). Attached in sphinx-like attitude to the right-hand branch, is the beautiful caterpillar of the Privet Hawk-Moth (Sphinx Ligustri). A SUMMER DAY'S DREAM. ,T was a sultry day in August. Well, nothing could be more generally characteristic of "still life" than the day and hour, about a year ago, when, book in hand, we crept from our little sun-baked domicile, and throwing ourselves under the shade of a huge helm-pollard, plunged THE LACE-WINGED FLY. 249 not, we confess it, into our provided volume, but into a reverie about as drowsy and dreamy as the heated face of Dame Nature. And here we must notice, that, while all the other children, animal and vegetable, of our nursing-mother Earth, were taking their noontide slumber on her lap, one portion of her family, that, namely, composed of the insect crew, seemed resolved to keep the world stirring, or at least to make a stir in the world, whose sunny places seemed to be entirely abandoned to their use. These little impertinents, the pipers, and eke the dancers of the hour, seemed, in truth, to have taken complete possession of three elements air, earth, and water together with a large portion of the fourth, diffused through all by the fiery sun ; and, in thus possessing, gave apparent life to the elements themselves, making them reel again with insect " Mirth and revelry, Tipsy dance, and jollity." We might have repeated appropriately, from the volume in our hand, " Oh ! qui n'eut partage' 1'ivresse universelle, Que Pair, le jour, 1'insecte apportaient sur leur aille ? " " This glad ebriety who could but share The winged mirth of insect-season air ? " The intoxication of the day was with us, however, entirely of the somnolent character, and we had already closed our eyes on the bulkiest moving object within our range of sight namely, the lashing tail of a solitary cow, ruminant in an adjacent pond when we were startled by a light footstep on the back of our hand. It was not exactly a fairy who had come to visit us; but it was a little creature, both in form and attire, of most fairy-like seeming. It was none other, in short, than a lace-winged fly, 1 the most graceful insect of its 1 Vignette to " Fair and Fierce." B B 250 A MAGNIFYING FANCY. elegant and graceful tribe. " Truly," said we, as we looked upon her gauzy wings of delicate green, mingled in their iridescence with rainbow hues " truly it is a pity, my little lady, that there's so precious little of you ; that all this tissued bravery, and even those eyes of gold, should, only for lack of size, be overlooked by nearly all other eyes, save those only of some lace-winged lover, who for beauty, perhaps, may have no eye at all!" Our winged fair-one had, at all events, no ear for admiration expressed in (to her) an unknow r n tongue ; for before our complimentary address was ended she had dis- appeared. Only suppose, thought we, pursuing the train of fancy brought and left behind by the gauze-winged sylph ; suppose that, by the touch of some Circe's wand, all the insect forms creeping and flying and floating around us now less seen than heard and felt were all at once enlarged to the pro- portions they assume to the eye in that amusing raree-show, the solar microscope verily we should feel somewhat ill at ease in the strange company wherein we should figure then as insects most insignificant as performers playing certainly no first fiddle. " Gorgon and hydra and chimera dire" would not then exist only in the realms of imagination ; but fill to suffocation the atmospheric and the aqueous fluids, and walk in appalling reality on the solid earth. And amidst the crowd of shapes terrific, small, we take it, would be our in- clination to single out for admiration such among them as our lace- winged elegante; or, with the poet, to admire in " The beetle panoplied in gems of gold," the semblance of " A mailed angel on a battle day." At this moment a host not of angels, but of blood-thirsty AN ANGRY PHANTOM. 251 demons in the shape of gnats rose from the adjacent pond, and passed across our face. Using our book as a weapon of destruction, we felled a multitude to the earth ; and, in com- pletion of our angry purpose, trampled many of our fallen victims into the dusty ground. Scarcely had we done the deed, when something like a qualm of conscience, arising partly from our penchant for gnats before recorded, partly from the magnifying turn our thoughts had taken, shot through our heart. It passed, however, as rapidly away as the remnant of the insect host, whose enjoyment we had so murderously interrupted; and in a few minutes the drowsy incubus which had so long hovered over our head fairly wrapped us in its leaden wings in short, we fell asleep. Still our waking; fancies followed us. It seemed as though one of the gnats we had just exterminated rose from the ground, and, poised in air on a level with our face, set up a shrill hum, which presently assumed the distinctness of angry high-toned speech. " By what right," cried the little appa- rition, '* didst thou cut short the thread of my joyous life?" " Because/' answered we, " as one of creation's lords, we have the privilege of destroying everything that invades our peace." " And by what right art thou a lord of creation?" " By the right of reason." "Reason!" exclaimed the insect ghost; "say rather by right of size. Only let my stature equal thine, and see which would then possess the mastery !" As the winged phantom thus addressed us, her tiny form expanded ; her long hairy shanks stretching downwards reached the ground, and upwards waved like spectral arms above our head; her enormous eyes, motionless and prominent, seemed bursting with malignant spleen ; her antlers quivered with rage, and, pointing towards us her blood-extracting weapon, straight and long as the stiletto of an Italian bandit, she seemed about to plunge it in our heart ! We started to our 252 A MONSTER MULTITUDE. feet in terror ; and at that instant a sudden gloom, as of coming twilight, overspread the sky, while a flapping as of the canvas of ten thousand vessels proceeded from a winged multitude, monstrous now in bulk as in number, which filled the air. Attempting to escape, we nearly tumbled over not a stone, but an enormous beetle (bigger than the biggest turtle ever captured on the shores of the Antilles), and only regained our footing to tread upon the loathsome yielding body of a cater- pillar swollen to a serpent's size, and rolling its mutilated length about our ankles. All around, the darkened daylight presented only similar objects, half-revealed: ground, grass, flower, shrub, and tree, all laden or crushed by living masses through which we had, if possible, to force our way in order to gain the shelter of our roof. Armed by desperation, we continued to advance ; and what an advance it was ! Pierced by poisoned arrows, swords, and spears, in the shape of what, as stings, we once despised lacerated by forcep-jaws armed with shark-like teeth bruised by violent contact with the mail-clad limbs of grasshopper Goliaths and beetle Bevis's deafened and bewildered by sounds most strange and threat- ening, and of volume augmented in proportion to their utterer's bulk we ran the gauntlet through this infernal crew, and at length, when almost exhausted, reached our door. But entrance was even then not easy, for our portal was barricaded by thick silken ropes stretched across it in all directions. Unable to break, we contrived to sever them with our pocket- knife ; but (horror of horrors !) no sooner were the cords divided, than rapidly descending by one of them which hung loose above our head, a spider, big as a baboon, alighted on our shoulders, and made her long hairy legs meet around our neck. By a desperate effort we threw off our disgusting burthen, and, opening the house-door, shut it with all possible celerity ; but one of the spider's arms, stretched out to renew her grasp, crackled like a lobster's claw as we jammed it betwixt door and door-frame. As we entered our parlour a AN APPALLING SIGHT. 253 deafening buzz was our first salutation, and the daylight, obscured as it was without, could here scarcely penetrate at all by reason of a swarm of gigantic flies, which, unable to find room in the window, were crowding in double and triple ranks around it. Hastily retreating, we descended to the kitchen ; but here how shall we proceed ? We had escaped with life from the hideous assemblage through which we had achieved a passage. We had managed to avoid the fangs of the mur- derous bloated creature which had fastened upon our door, and then fastened upon us. We had shut her out, and we had shut in the swollen sickening blue-bottles; but what we had left behind was nothing to what awaited us an appalling horror which we shudder to describe. On entering the kitchen we saw not a living thing, not even Martha old Martha our faithful factotum, upon whom we called, albeit in a trembling voice, fearful to attract the notice of some hidden lurker amongst our new and hideous enemies ; but no Martha replied, as expected, from the scullery ; and, with a dread of we scarce knew what, well nigh exhausted also by terror and exertion, we sat us down in her arm-chair. The sky was still partially obscured by monstrous creatures on the wing, and evening was now approaching, so that there was little light in the apart- ment but what proceeded from the fire, which had burnt very low. We had not been seated long before we were startled by a slight noise proceeding from one of the deep and dark recesses on either side of the chimney; and, on looking into it, we could just discern, indistinctly, some moving object. What this might be we dreaded to ascertain ; but with a shaking hand we lighted a candle by the dying embers, and held it up within the recess. Then, oh ! the spectacle that we beheld ! Supported by her enormous web a tissue of mingled cable - sat an elephantine spider, to which our assailant at the house- door was a mere pigmy, a spider of most hideous aspect, her eight glassy eyes sparkling with greedy ecstasy as she gorged upon a fresh-caught, fresh-killed victim, and that victim no 254 THE FINALE. heedless, idle fly, but, alas! that busy bee, Martha our faithful Martha ! For a moment we stood horror-stricken ; then, armed by rage and grief and the kitchen poker, we rushed upon the loathsome murderess, who, intent upon her prey, heeded not our approach, and, with a single blow, brought her bloated body lifeless to the ground, that of her victim falling: with it. O What a night of terror did we pass, holding our vigil by the dead ; but we held it not alone, for beside poor Martha's hearth, mocking or mourning its desolation, sat a monstrous cricket, piercing our ear and heart with his shrilly chirp; while at intervals loud as the ticking of a church-clock rose the warning click of an enormous death-watch. We heard no more our heart sickened our head swam our powerless arms quitted their hold and we fell into the insect monster's devouring jaw? Not a bit of it, dear reader. We only fell (having suddenly awoke) from the appalling position to which our sleeping fancy had raised us, to the flowery bank which had been our bed beneath the old elm pollard. "What a precious extravaganza!" we mentally exclaimed, as sitting up we recovered a joyful consciousness of the realities around the pleasant realities of a summer's evening for the sun had declined, and a refreshing breeze was waving the silken, silvery heads of the reeds below us. We are no interpreters of visions our own or other people's ; but being, in our way, a sort of utilitarian, we have always fancied that dreams (not merely those which would seern sent expressly for reproof or warning, but dreams in general) may be made available to good by the process of recalling and turning their purport over in our minds, even as we should muse habitually over our waking thoughts; a mental exercise than which, according to philosophers, there is none more useful. With a view to some such purpose of improvement, we DEDUCTIONS FROM A DREAM. 255 thought over, as we walked homewards, the late vagary of our napping fancy, and were not long in deducing from it some admiring reflections on the nice proportion as to numbers, size, and power, preserved through every order of creation ; a pro- portion to destroy which, in any one department, would be to bring destruction upon all. This conclusion and our own threshold we reached at the same moment, and then occurred to us. a subordinate and domestic purpose, to which our recent dream was also appli- cable. " I'll tell it, or a part of it, to Martha, and perhaps through very fear she will grow more lenient towards the spiders, and I shall hear less of her incessant broom ! " rMY H The three beautiful and rapacious insects forming the subject of this vignette, are Dragon, Scorpion, and Lacewing Flies. The first, a small and common species (Agrion), rests upon a hedge while discussing its cannibal repast, a captured gnat. Hovering just above is the Dragon-Fly's enemy, and sometimes conqueror, the Scorpion-Fly (Panorpa), so called from the appendage to its tail. To its left appears the graceful Lacewing (ffemerobius), green and golden-eyed ; the rose-leaf to the right, below, being occupied by a grub, or larva (magnified), of the same carnivorous insect busy in its usual occupation of destroying Aphides. FAIR AND FIERCE. HERE are now to be seen almost everywhere, hawking about lanes and hedges in search of prey fair as the sunshine, and fierce as its meridian rays three insect families of the Linnaean order Neuroptera, which are well worth observing for their beauty, and studying for the pecu- DRAGON-FLIES. . 257 liarities of their economy. These comprise dragon-flies, scor- pion-flies, and lace-wing flies ; the former, from their imposing size, well known by sight to everybody ; while the two latter, though both, especially the lace-wing, of surpassing elegance and beauty, are as commonly overlooked, on account of their comparatively inconspicuous size. To begin then, in deference to their superior magnitude (which in some species constitute them the largest of British insects), with the dragon-flies, popularly called by the French " Demoiselles" partly, perhaps, in compliment to their beauty, partly as a satire on Amazonian propensities. By the ignorant among ourselves they are known as " horse-stingers," a com- plete misnomer, seeing that the blood wherewith they delight to moisten their carnivorous jaws is never, by any accident, taken from those warm red streams which flow through the veins of beast or man, but consists of that colder, whiter fluid, which pervades the tender frames of butterfly and case-fly the innocent creatures they are ever seeking to devour. Since our readers may not, just at pleasure, be able to capture a living specimen of the large green dragon-fly? now so abundant, let them look, en attendant, at one of a smaller species 2 depicted by our pencil. Though a minim of his kind, is he not a glorious yet formidable looking creature ? Mark his four large ever-expanded wings of glassy membrane, with their beautiful lace-like nervures, not distributed for mere adornment, but in every meander serving as channels for the circulating air, which, thus spread over the surface of the pinion, confers on this insect a marked pre-eminence in power and permanence of flight. Observe his straight, slender body so long and light contrasting with his muscular chest and bulky shoulders, fit receptacles for the insertion of those powerful pinions ; and the legs, six in number, strong and rigid, and armed with claws. But notice, above all, the head 1 jEshnu varia. 2 Agrion. 258 THE BUTTERFLY'S ARCH-ENEMY. the round enormous head nearly the whole of its upper half occupied by large prominent eyes, which, in their crystal- line transparency, differ remarkably from the generality of visual organs among insects, with their lifeless appearance of dull opacity. In these there is no lack of vivid expression, as the numerous hexagons of which they are composed seem to be for ever in motion, now appearing visible, then seeming lost beneath their translucent common covering or cornea. With the threatening animation of these rapacious-looking eyes, the mouth and powerful jaws are in formidable accordance; and if, in the sight of its insect victims, this veritable dragon of their tribes wears anything like the aspect he bears in ours (his terrors magnified by superior size, and perhaps, also, by instinctive dread), with what trepidation must defenceless case- flies flee before him, and what a panic must be created by his very shadow amongst a bevy of white-robed butterflies, when assembled, according to their wont, in a water-drinking party round a pond. Well may ye tremble, ye harmless sippers, at the approach of this, your arch-destroyer, as ye catch the sound of his rapid flight audible, perhaps, to your delicate antennae, though silent to our coarser ears ! Well may ye rise in terror and confusion, when ye behold his terrible image reflected, with your own fair forms, upon the surface of the liquid mirror at your feet ! But little will your feathered wings avail you when matched in flight against his bare and nervous pinions. Whether you await or endeavour to escape "him whether at rest or in the air he will pounce upon you, tear off, without mercy, your painted pinions ; and, when re- duced to a disfigured mutilated trunk, bear you off in triumph to the first convenient resting-place some bough or paling there to glut his maw upon your honied juices, while repose gives him new vigour for the pursuit and massacre of others of your race ! Such is the dragon-fly in his form of maturity, and, even in his earliest stage that of a crawling, wingless grub, LARVA AND DRAGON-FLY. 259 groping in the mire, or swimming through the water of the pond over which he subsequently soars, he exhibits the same savage propensities, only modified by form and situation. He is, in short, " a murderer from the beginning/' distinguished for remarkable rapacity, with endowments yet more remarkable for its gratification. These we have already noticed under our head of " water-devils," amongst which, while a grub or larva, the dragon-fly figures as a very Beelzebub. In the present month (August), and on to October, the large green dragon- fly 1 is commonly seen on the wing, in sunshine, near streams and hedges, or found resting, of an evening, on water-plants or low bushes. We have spoken of the dragon-fly's four powerful pinions as always open, in readiness for flight. This is generally the case with the families of j?Eshna and Libellula ; but in some, the wings, when at rest, are applied to the body, as in the instance of a very common but very pretty little species, 2 with bodies variously coloured (as blue and black red and black green and black) which are, in most places, numerous over ditches in May and June ; in which months another species (the large black and yellow), is also not uncommon. About two hundred different kinds are said to haunt the woods and streams of Britain. From the dragon-fly the above redoubtable giant among English insects we come, by no very abrupt transition, except in the great difference of their bulk, to the scorpion-fly, 3 a lesser but no less striking specimen of the u fair and fierce." It would even seem that with reference to the quality of fierce- ness, or more properly of valour, this latter insect is well worthy of precedence over its bulkier class-fellow, of which, being invariably the foe, it is not unfrequently the conqueror. Only look at these enemies by nature, the great dragon and the little scorpion flies, in juxta-position, and, on comparison 1 Figured with its puparium in the Vignette to " COMING OUT." 2 Of this is the insect figured in Vignette. 3 Panorpa, also in Vignette. C C 260 THE SCORPION-FLY. of tbeir respective sizes and apparent powers, you will hardly admit the possibility that when opposed in single combat the latter should come off victor. Yet thus it stands recorded in the chronicles of insect doings, wherein, on good authority, it is written that the tyrant of our lakes and pools (cowardly as tyrants are wont to be) is terrified even at sight of a scorpion fly assailant. One of these valorons pygmies is related by Lyonnet to have attacked, in his presence, a dragon-fly ten times its own size to have brought it to the ground, pierced it with its sharp proboscis, and have left it with life only through the interference of the naturalist spectator. This insect " hero of a thousand fights" bears in his tail a formidable-looking, sting-like weapon, which might seem mainly instrumental to victory in such unequal combats ; but dangerous as this may appear, his nasal dagger, or stiletto, does him, we believe, the most good service both in attack and demolition of his bulky foes. He doubtless, however, finds a use for the appendage at his tail, and albeit we have found it harmless within our capturing grasp, its bearer owes the name of " Scorpion-fly" to its great resemblance outwardly to the deadly sting of the scorpion of tropic climates. From May to November these pretty flies are everywhere common upon hedges and in gardens, where, with predacious activity, they make cruel sport under the summer sun, cooling down, with advance of autumn, into a milder state of com- parative inactivity, which renders them an easy prey alike to bird and entomologist. Last, in our trio of "the fair and fierce," but for either attribute not least, comes the beautiful green and golden-eyed lace-winged day fly 1 like the daisy (day's eye), loving sunny weather, and the most elegant perhaps of all insects upon which the sun (in Britain) ever shines wanting only augmented bulk to render it an object of universal admiration. The form of the " lace-wing" is always graceful whether 1 Hemerolius (vignette.) LACE-WINGED FLY. 261 at rest, with her ample folded wings, arching and sweeping, train-like, over her slender limbs and body or whether by expansion of these her gauzy pinions, she displays to more advantage their most delicate workmanship a net of nervures, interlaced over a thin transparent tissue, beautifully iridescent with varying hues of azure blue and rose colour. But above all may this insect-beauty, if she ever takes flattering counsel at a dew-drop mirror, pride herself on the peculiar lustre of her eyes a metallic brilliance closely resembling that of bur- nished gold. There lurks, however, under these glittering orbs, as much deception (though of a much more harmless character) as belongs frequently to others hazel, black, and blue. Their burnish is but gilding, being (like that on the skins of various chrysalides) produced only by an opaque varnish under the cornea. 1 With all her beauty, and all her seeming gentleness, she bears about her no odour of sweetness on the contrary, an ill-conditioned scent ; and could we but inquire of her character amongst insect nations, especially amongst the tribes of Aphides, 2 which people the waving foliage, we should find her name, amongst them, in worse odour even than her person. The very story that flocks might bleat about the wolf, or turkeys gabble of the fox, these aphides would certainly relate to us of the lace-winged fly. " She invades," would they declare, "our verdant pastures, drains our blood, sometimes even dresses herself in the skins of our slaughtered brethren, and for this, as well for the harmless mien which cloaks her ruthless nature, may be looked on, not merely as a wolf, but as a wolf in sheep's clothing." Thus would say the little aphides; and the same character, with features somewhat enlarged, but by no means softened, we are compelled in justice to assign to their arch enemy, who, even before she has lacy wings to boast of, or golden eyes to look upon the day, begins her murderous ravages among their leaf-sucking tribes. 1 See Painting, Carving, and Gilding. 2 See article on Aphides. 262 EGGS OF THE LACE-WING. But let us commence the history of the lace-wing at its beginning even from the egg which in itself presents (by the way) a tiny object too singular as well as pretty to be over- looked. There are to be seen, from May to August, attached to various leaves, but those chiefly of the rose tree, certain slender filaments, green or white, surmounted by an oval head, and arranged sometimes, fringe-like, round the edge some- times in groups on the surface of the leaf standing sometimes singly and distinct sometimes with heads united in a cluster. These heads, with their delicate stalk-like appendages, are none other than the eggs of the lace-wing fly ; but it hardly needs to be observed, that from no such minute envelopes could possibly emerge her winged descendants, which, like all nearly of the insect race, have to reach their perfect form through three successive stages of development. Looking now upon the lace-wing in its earliest shape of animation, that of larva a flat, wingless^ six-legged crawler, wanting only size to make it frightful as well as hideous we exclaim, " Can it be possible that an object so unsightly can contain within it the germs of grace and beauty ?" Even so ; and here, when without disguise "fierce" but not yet "fair'" we behold the wolf of aphides playing havoc amongst these flocks of foliage, which, with more than lamb-like passiveness, permit themselves to be individually picked out and slaughtered by their terrible but apparently undreaded enemy, to her their green pellucid bodies, filled with saccharine juice, are so many honey-pots, which she knows well the trick of empty- ing (at the rate of three in half a minute) by means of her imperforate as well as pointed jaws. When thus reduced to skins, the spoils of victim aphides are frequently observed so heaped up around their destroyer as to seem purposely col- lected to serve it for a cover a proceeding which Kirby has illustrated by comparing it to that of Hercules in clothing himself with the skin of the Nemean lion. When our wolf of aphis flocks assumes the second form of LACE-WING PUPA. 263 her existence, and becomes from an active grub or larva (correspondent to the caterpillar of Lepidopterce) an inanimate pupa (the likeness of the chrysalis), she furnishes of course but slender matter for the historian of insects. Yet, even in this, her stage of passive transition, our " Lace-wing'^ in progress affords us something worth observing. After being wearied of aphis slaughter, whereon she has attained her full growth, her last active operation is to enwrap her body in a silken shroud or cocoon, spun previously, not after caterpillar usage by an apparatus at the mouth, but by one provided for the purpose at the tail. Before dismissing our trio of the " Fair and Fierce" the dragon, the scorpion, and the lace- wing flies we must bespeak indulgence for their fierceness not in favour of their beauty, but on account of the usefulness of their devouring propen- sities. mm&lr ou tit f approach of nour arrli - The mimicry of vegetable by animal forms is here illustrated by figures of some looping caterpillars, termed "Walking branches," and by that of a moth, the Oak Lappet (Gastropacha quercifolia\ likened to a Walking Leaf. Above the latter, fixed motionless to a branch of hawthorn, which it closely simulates, is the caterpillar of the Brimstone Moth (Rumia cratcegata), the moth itself appearing in flight above. On the left, another stick caterpillar that of the Swallow-tail Moth (Ourapterix sambucaria), is attached to a branch of elder, of which it affords a close copy in form, colour, and markings. A second specimen of the same in its walking position forms an arch upon the branch below. RESEMBLANCE AND RELATION. HE last time we were in the public insect- room of the British Museum, our notice was attracted by a buzz of admiration raised by a cluster of a Monday's swarm gathered round one particular case of the entomologic collec- tion. "Well, I never!" "Queer creatures!" "Neither WALKING LEAVES. 265 grass nor grasshoppers!" "How curious!" "Perfectly exquisite!" "What strange similitudes!" "Links between the animal and the vegetable," and so on, ascending. The above notes of admiration, varied according to the mental compass of each observer, were drawn forth by different specimens of those curious tropical insects, known popularly as " Walking Leaves," an appropriate appellation, presenting as they do a perfect resemblance in form, colour, texture, and veining to vegetable foliage in every stage of progression, from verdant expansion to shrivelled decay. These strange copies, not of leaves only, but also of branches, are found in several insect tribes and families, but chiefly those of Locusta, Mantis, and Phasma. Some of the tribe of Mantis treacherous and cruel crea- tures, with long, desiccate, skeleton limbs are like spectral anatomies of vegetable death yet living and locomotive. But we need not visit India or China or even the British Museum or other collections of foreign insects to find similar resemblances, and sometimes such perfect ones between the insect and the plant that both would seem to have been cast in a common mould then endowed, the one with an animal, the other with what Dr. Darwin would have called " a vege- table soul." To discover an English specimen of such curious similitude, we have only, in this present month of August, to shake some boughs of a hawthorn hedge over an inverted parasol or umbrella, into which will almost of a surety then fall some two or three living and moving sticks, or caterpillars of stick-like form, 1 quite as "queer" and closely imitative as some of the foreigners above noted. These strange little animals have a brown skin, wrinkled and furrowed just like the bark of the branches they are accustomed to occupy, with a forked protuberance on the back resembling diverging twigs or nascent thorns; while, to render his mimicry the more 1 Vignette. 266 WALKING BRANCHES. complete, this caterpillar sprig of the hawthorn, in common with others of branch-like semblance, is in the habit, when at rest, of stretching himself out stiff and straight, at right angles with the twig whereon he reposes; and thus remaining for hours motionless, supported only by the grasp of his hind legs, and a single thread proceeding from his mouth. This is the caterpillar of a very common yellow moth, with reddish markings, called the Brimstone, 1 and belongs to a family known to collectors as Geometers, Measurers, Loopers, and Surveyors. In the month of May, or beginning of June, we may often, by careful looking for, find a branch of elder supporting its very image in a caterpillar, 2 which is perhaps the most re- 'markable of the above singular family a withered-looking, stick-like creature, knobbed and ringed and coloured, and even cracked after the exact pattern of the browner stalks of its native tree. This most perfect simulator, like others of his simulating relatives, aids the deception of his figure by his branch-like attitudes and branch-like quietude (often main- tained from morning till night), at which latter period he mostly prefers to exercise both his jaws and locomotive powers. After the usual changes, this curious caterpillar becomes, about July, a pale sulphur-coloured moth, remarkable for the elegant cut of its angular pinions, of which the hinder pair, being prolonged into acute tails, have given it the name of " Swal- low Tail. 3 So much for walking-branches of British growth ; neither, as aforesaid, is a walking-/eo/* a wonder to be seen alive only in foreign parts. We must wait, perhaps, till the arrival of July ; but then, if with eyes prepared, w r e look amongst the foliage of a mingled hedge, we are likely to detect, on a bram- ble, a hawthorn, or a blackthorn, or may be on a willow, a leaf endued with life more than vegetative, albeit offeuille morte 1 Rumia cratagata. 8 Vignette. 3 Ourapterix sambucaria. OAK-LAPPET. 207 hue, and wearing little of motive semblance. We have said a leaf; but we should rather, perhaps, direct the unpractised eye to seek what more resembles a leafy group or cluster; 1 an object for which, on a transitory glance, the four large wings of the Lappet Moth 2 are very likely to be mistaken. These are of shaded brown, glossed with violet, stiff, strongly-ribbed, and deeply scallopped, and when the insect is in repose (its usual state in the day-time) they are so disposed by projection of the hinder pair beyond the foremost, as to deviate from the usual moth-like contour, and thus approach more nearly to that of congregated leaves. The seeming vagaries of Dame Nature in thus, as it were, dressing up some few among her children in masquerade attire, have led to a deal of curious inquiry into the " why and because" of such unusual proceeding. Besides such copies as those above noted, wherein the animal is made to put on the vegetable form, there are noticeable among insects a number of remarkable similarities in colouring with the leaves, or flowers, or bark of the plants and trees they feed on, or frequent; and, what is yet more curious, with the dead and artificially-wrought substances, such as stone walls and wooden palings, on which they are most frequently seen resting. Of the kind of imitation last mentioned we have noticed several instances in the colouring of moths found commonly on oak palings. We have one in our possession wherein not only does the painting of the wings resemble the broad surface of the wood, copied as accurately as by the most skilful grainer; but even the transverse cutting at the pale's end would seem to have served as a pattern for the striated covering of the insect's shoulders. Our subject was commenced by a notice of a few remarkable objects in the insect world, which bear a particular resemblance to others in the vegetable kingdom. Let us now point out, as 1 Vignette. 2 Gastropacha quercifolia. 268 PLANTS AND INSECTS. equally worthy of notice, though less likely to excite it, a few resemblances of a more general kind between these two departments of the reign of nature. In external form, hues, and clothing, there is quite sufficient of general likeness betwixt plants and insects to stamp them as productions of the same designing mind and matchless skill. In clothing, wool, hair, spines, and scales are common to both. Flowers alone emulate the colours of the more splendid butterflies and beetles. The delicate veined leaflet or petal are prevailing similitudes of form drawn yet closer in the papilionaceous tribe ; the purple pea-flower and the yellow broom telling us, in poetic per- sonality, " The butterfly all green and gold To me hath often flown, Here in my blossoms to behold Wings lovely as his own." Wordsworth. As well as ephemeral flowers there are ephemeral insects. The gauzy wings of the May-fly, like the delicate petals of the cistus, strew the ground in a few brief hours after their expan- sion ; and the Favonia, 1 which displays its crimson glories in the beams of morning (as is the case often with the ephemeral insect) is, like it, dead by noon-day. There are certain flowers, such as the goat's beard, &c, which are known to time their opening at certain hours of the day ; and so, in like manner, various moths have been observed to emerge from their chrysalis-covering with equal regularity. Again, the daisy, the pimpernel, and many other flowers, show the nicest sensibility to atmospheric changes, by always shutting up their petals at the approach of bad weather ; and the bee, the butterfly, and other insects, with an instinctive prescience of coming showers, hide within the flower-cups, or close their wings, fearfully resting from their labours or their pleasures. Numerous also are the properties and productions common 1 Tigridia favonia. THEIR RELATIONS. 269 to plants and insects, with a few of which we must close our very imperfect enumeration of resembling points between them. In fragrance, even the rose is emulated by a pretty green beetle 1 not uncommonly found near willow-trees, around which it perfumes the air. Per contra and opposed to all " the sweets of Arabia " there are the cockroach the churchyard beetle the fetid centipede, and other lurkers in damp dark places, both above ground and below, which resemble in ill odour, as they do in gloomy localities, the hellebores, the hem- locks, and the mandrakes of the vegetable world. And as a few among the flowers of the sun are not a whit behind their darker fellows in this one repulsive quality, so among insects, to say nothing of the pretty lady-bird, there is the green, golden-eyed, lace-winged fly, 2 that exhales an odour which, even pour V amour de ses beaux yeux, and for the elegance of its form, one can scarcely pardon, any more than for its splen- dour, one can cordially admire that pride of the hot-house, the most beautiful but most foetid of the Stapelios, named, by the Dutch inhabitants of the Cape, the Arabische Hose. The power of emitting light is another property, common, in some peculiar instances, both to plants and insects, the fire- fly the glow-worm and the electric centipede, each having its vegetable representative in the luminous Fraxinella, the Euphorbia phosphorea, and various plants and fungi in a state of decay. For almost every vegetable production there is an analogous insect secretion. To say nothing of honey and bees' wax, which may be viewed rather as vegetable products animalized, there is the white insect wax of China produced by the Cicada limbata, made into candles, and paralleled both in quality and use by the tallow-tree, a native of the same empire. For vegetable gums, we have the insect gum-lac; for vegetable dyes, the insect cochineal, galls, and chermes. 1 Cerambyx moschatus (musk beetle). 2 Chrysopa perla. D D 270 INSECT DEVELOPMENT. If, leaving the vegetable world, we were to mount upwards in the scale of animated being, we should find amongst fish, reptiles, birds, and quadrupeds, a variety of similar instances, wherein, by resemblance or analogy, by dependence, or as mutually representative, these all stand connected with objects in the insect kingdom. We may, from time to time, notice some of these relations incidentally; but to pass over, now, the intermediate orders of creation, let us see whether lordly man, as well as the lowly plant, has not his analogies, at least symbolic, with the insect he despises. The mind of man, as it exists in infancy, has been aptly likened to the seed of a plant considered as possessing, in miniature, the trunk, branches, leaves, and fruit of the future tree ; and, agreeably to such a notion, it has been observed that the highest degree of cultivation, of which it is capable, consists in the perfect development of that peculiar organization which as really exists in infancy as in mature years. Having noted already the analogy of insect development, from the egg up to the winged estate, with that of a vegetable, from the seed up to the flower and fruit it scarcely needs, the above admitted, to remark that the human mind finds its natural parallel (only one yet more striking) in the insect as well as in the vegetable world. In the shapes also of good or evil, which the expanding mind assumes, we shall still find, in insect forms and their marked characteristics, similitudes if not more apt, at least more easily observed, than those presented by larger tribes. In proportion as, diverging by perversity of free will from our divine type and pattern, we resemble or make ourselves the moral counterparts of the tiger, the fox, the hawk, the serpent, we are of course as justly symbolized by those insects which have been observed to concentrate in their pigmy forms the very essence of the same instinctive dispositions, such as the cruel Mantis, the fierce predatory beetles, the wily ant-lion, the treacherous and cruel spider. SYMBOLIC ANALOGIES. 271 The same applies to those among us of gentler frame, the lambs and doves amidst the wolves and hawks of human society, which are in like manner aptly symbolized by insect tribes of gentle habits (especially the horned and vegetable- feeding beetles), which have been considered to represent the grazing quadrupeds. Others of our qualities our industry, our prudence, our fickleness, our temerity are exhibited also in the tiny indi- vidualities and miniature institutions of insects and insect societies, none of the larger animals, solitary or gregarious, reflecting us in these respects so faithfully as the bee, the ant, the butterfly, and self-destructive moth. K,'f^W The Moths in this group are of those not figured in the frontispiece. That in the foreground, beneath the white convolvulus, is the common " Tiger " (Arctia co/a); the smaller insect above, is the Humming-Bird Sphynx (flfacroglossa stellatarum), uncoiling its tongue for insertion into the flower. The large one to the left, the Lime-Hawk (Smerinthus Tilice). Above, in upward flight, is the elegant " White Plume " (Pterophorus pentadactylui) ; next, beneath it, is the little "Clearwing" (jEgeria tipuliformis) ; and, below this, a " Vapourer " ( Orgyia antiqua), of which the nearly wingless female occupies, still lower, a branch of hawthorn supporting also the cocoon, which she employs as a bed for the reception of her eggs. MOTHS AS IDLERS. OTHS have been arranged under two general divisions : crepuscular, or those that are seen on wing at twilight j and nocturnal, or night- fliers ; the latter comprising by far the largest number. The twilight family consists chiefly of hawk-moths or sphinxes; the former appellative being HAWK-MOTHS AND SPHINXES. 273 founded on the moth's hovering mode of flight, the latter, on the caterpillar's remarkable form and position when at rest. When the gaudy butterfly has folded her wings for sleep, and while the dark night-flying moth is still lurking under leafy covert, various sphinxes may be seen darting rapidly from flower to flower, or busied in rifling their sweets as they hang suspended over their honeyed cups. These insect tipplers imbibe their deep potations by unrolling their usually coiled tongues, which are hollow tubes, often of prodigious length, and plunging them to the bottom of the nectaries they drain. Many of the hawk-moths are named after the trees and plants which furnish the favourite food of their caterpillar life ; and from among these we shall select, as greatly distin- guished for size and beauty, the " Convolvulus " l and the " Privet." The former, called also the " Bind-weed " and the " Unicorn " hawk-moth, is a splendid specimen of its kind, if the term " splendid " so often ridiculously misapplied may be aptly employed with reference to its wide expanse of wing (reaching often to an extension of four inches and a-half), and to the exquisitely varied yet sober pencilling, black on a ground of ashy grey, wherewith these ample pinions are elaborately adorned. Of a different genus,- and of size very much inferior to the two last, but more interesting, perhaps, than either in its habits and associations, is the hawk-moth called the " Hum- ming-bird/' 3 This name is derived from the vibratory sound emitted by the wings of this pretty insect, as it hangs sus- pended, morning and evening, above the flowers, of which the honeyed treasures, however deeply hidden, are never inacces- sible to its prying tongue. Not even the long, narrow flagons of Marvel of Peru, or trumpet honeysuckle, can protect their 1 Sphinx convolvuli. a Macroglossa. 3 Macroglossa stellatarum. (Vignette.) 274 DEATH'S-HEAD MOTH. delicious nectar from the long, pliant trunk of the humming- bird hawk. A word now for the hawk-moth "Death's head," 1 to whom, perhaps, we ought to have given precedence over all the above, on account of his yet superior size and the dark celebrity of his name ; but though called a " hawk," and long classed with the sphinxes, he is not considered now as belonging strictly to that family, from which he is distinguished by the very in- ferior length of his trunk, and also of his antennae. The caterpillars of hawk-moths are, for the most part, very distinguished animals of their kind. They are generally large, with skins smooth or curiously shagreened ; most frequently coloured green, and adorned on each side by oblique stripes of yellow, blue, or crimson. They may be further and easily discriminated from the " vulgar crew," by a stiff-pointed horn rising from near the tail; also by the remarkable elevation (when at rest) of the head and shoulders, while the hinder legs attach them firmly to a supporting branch. From this peculiar position, they have derived the Linnaaan name of Sphinx after the fabled monster of antiquity. Now fora few more of the distinctive features which belong, in their first estate, to the " Hawks," above noticed, namely, the " Con- volvulus," "Privet," "Humming-bird," "Death's head," " Lime," " Poplar," and " Eyed." ^But we must no longer creep with the hawk caterpillars, or even hover, at morn or eve, with the " hawks " themselves, over the dewy flowers, for we have yet to accompany, in their gloomier flights, a select few from the nocturnal Phalcence which compose the main body of moths proper, or second grand division of Lepidopterous insects. Among these, the night-fliers (holding a reverse proportion to those amongst the feathered race) far exceed in number, not only the evening ' Acherontia atropos. GREAT GOAT MOTH. 275 flitters of their own division, but also the " painted populace " which sip honey in open day. Now for our select few amongst the numerous night-fliers. But how to choose out of such a phalanx ? That is the ques- tion ; and suppose taking a cursory review of it, with reference to size, colour, and form we note a few individuals among the most distinguished for either attribute. For size, we may give priority to the Great Goat Moth, of \vhose bulky body and dusky wings, of from three to four inches of expansion, we are not unlikely to catch a glimpse by the light of this August moon. This is the great Cossus, of whose proceedings as a carpenter caterpillar we have already given some description. " And no great loss either, this dingy insect owl, to the world of grace and beauty!" might some, perhaps, be ready to exclaim, on seeing a specimen of the Great Goat Moth. But differing, with all courtesy, from the taste which can dis- cern no beauty save in varied colours, we must be allowed to express, for ourselves, no little admiration of the sober paint- ing the silvery or ashy grey, clouded with brown and striated with black which, not unlike the plumage of some veritable owls, adorns the plain-cut pinions of this " owlish " moth. In accordance with that beautiful harmony prevalent throughout the works of Nature, the general colouring of moths, both of evening and night, is of that subdued tone which, like night-blowing flowers the " Flores tristes colore et odore " seems to correspond best with the hours of their appearance. This usual absence of brilliant tints is, as we have already exemplified, amply atoned for by the soft, richly- blended shading, and exquisitely pencilled variety of pattern, which render the wings of moths perfect bijoux of natural mosaic; but there are not wanting among them scattered specimens painted in another style in bright and glowing colours, laid on in broad effective masses. Of this we have a ready example in one of the commonest, yet withal hand- 276 TIGER MOTHS. somest of our night-fliers, yclept "the Tiger;" the rich embla- zonment of whose ample pinions has been likened by no mean poet to that of an ancient window : " All diamonded with panes of quaint device, Innumerable of stains, and splendid dj'es, As are the Tiger Moth's deep damask wings." ' The prevailing hues of this beautiful genus are black, crimson, and yellow, or cream-colour, disposed elegantly in spots and bars. The most common of several species is the ''Great Tiger," 2 found in all parts of Britain from June to August. Its foremost wings are of rich dark brown, varied by zigzag bars of cream colour; the hinder, of brilliant scarlet with black spots, surrounded mostly by a yellow circlet, the body being also scarlet barred with black. The Tiger caterpillar, seen more frequently even than the moth, and sometimes in winter as well as summer, has a black velvety skin, covered with long brown-tipped hairs, proceeding from white tubercles. It is a feeder on dandelion, lettuce, and other salad plants, and, from its habit, when touched, of rolling round (an innocent measure of self-defence), has acquired the misnomer of Devil's Ring. 3 Having said as much of our night-fliers, with reference to peculiarities of size and colour, as our proscribed limits will permit, we shall now notice a few of them distinguished especially with regard to form. Amongst the latter is the moth called the Oak Lappet, 4 already made known to our readers as a " Walking Leaf" the only specimen of British growth ; and the very image of a "feuille morte" or, more properly, of several dead leaves together, does it present, in its large wings of rusty brown, deeply indented, and projecting, the hindmost beyond the foremost pair. 5 In the majority of moths the hinder wings are rounded ; but 1 Keats. 2 Arctia caja. 3 Vignette to " Life in Death." 4 Gastropacha quercifoliu. 5 Vignette to " Resemblance and Relation." SWALLOW-TAIL. 277 in the "Swallow-tail" we meet with a remarkable deviation from this usual form the hindmost pinions being prolonged, as well as the foremost, into an acute tail. Commencing its nocturnal rambles before the usual con- clusion of our evening walks, the delicate sulphur-coloured pinions of this pretty insect often flit past us in the June and July twilights; when, in accordance with a comparison already suggested, we might fancy it an evening primrose on the wing. The wing of the moth, as of the butterfly, generally owes its beauty to the rich mosaic of minute scales or feathers by which it is overlaid, entirely, as it would seem, by way of or- nament ; for the creature can use its pinions when reduced to transparent membranes, as well as other insects, or a few of its own tribe in which they are naturally clear. Its progress through the air is no more impeded by the rough handling of wantonness or weather, than the flight of true genius by the rough rubs of fortune, however they may strip its soaring energies of the variegated trappings of worldly splendour. There exists, however, a singular and beautiful family of moths, called the " Plumed," to which the above remark is by no means applicable the wing feathers of this tribe being as essential to flight, and serving as much to form its organ, as those in the pinions of the feathered race. Who has not noticed, in gardens and by hedge-rows, floating towards evening in the summer air, an object resembling a large tuft of down, or a snow-flake dropped (a marvel !) from a summer cloud ? When followed to its place of settlement (usually some plant or lowly shrub), this questionable wanderer will prove one of the moths just mentioned, that, probably, designated the " Large White Plume;" 1 a little creature (large only by comparison) with wings consisting each of a single 1 Pterophorus pentadactylus. 278 PLUMED MOTHS. row of long quilled feathers of spotless white and silken gloss, the delicate body and slender legs being of the same unsullied hue, contrasted only by large black eyes. This fairy moth, than which few more elegant and graceful flit beneath the moon, comes of a greenish white, dusky-spotted caterpillar, common on the nettles of every hedge ; and the " White Plume" has a cousin, less fair and less in size, but not less beautiful than herself, yclept the "Twenty Plume," 1 from the number of separate feathers of which her variegated brown pinions are composed. Though of course less conspicuous than the former, the latter is even more easily and frequently to be met with ; for, as if inviting the admiration she so well deserves, this beau- tiful little flutterer often enters our dwellings, and spreads her feather fans for our inspection as she dances in the window a place of shelter to which she often resorts from the bleak winds of March, or the early frosts of late October; for our little " Twenty Plume," fragile as she looks, is no mere bird of summer. Having made allusion to certain moths wherein are alto- gether wanting those merely ornamental appendages, the coloured scales or feathers which usually clothe the wings of their tribe, we must say a little more about them; though that little will here be somewhat out of place, inasmuch as the few " clear-winged " belong more nearly, by habits and other affinities, to the Hawk and Twilight Moths first discoursed of, than to the nocturnal division from which our subjects have been subsequently drawn. Towards the end of May there may be seen, sipping honey on the wing, (chiefly, however, in the woods and gardens of Surrey, Kent, and Essex), an insect with a short robust, yel- lowish-olive body, not very dissimilar to that of a drone bee, except that it is distinguished by some terminating rings of 1 Alucita hexadaciyla. WINGLESS MOTHS. 279 deep red, finished at the extremity by a black and yellow tuft. From its clear, transparent, brown-bordered wings, none but the " initiate" would take it for other than a curious sort of fly or bee, whereas it is in fact the " Bee Hawk-moth," - one of those above alluded to. Of another family, 2 but resembling the last in naked transparency of pinion, there is the " Bee Clear-wing" which, in the heat of noonday, is accustomed to flit rapidly from flower to flower, alighting on their corollas to extract their sweets. From moths with wings painted in mosaic, wings of feathers, and wings naked, we come lastly to moths without any wings at all. There is a certain moth, classed among the nocturnal, but often to be seen abroad in August sunshine an active, rest- less, prying little fellow, who can boast, besides a single pair of horns or antennae magnificently feathered, a double pair of bright brown wings, the foremost dotted each with a spot of white, and of as ample dimensions as any reasonable little moth need desire. This gay, sunshiny " nocturnal " is called the " Vapourer;'' 3 but, if we may be allowed a pun upon his name, it is his lady to whom the malady of vapours might seem the most likely to be incidental, seeing that while her mate is taking his winged pleasure abroad, she (poor soul !) is compelled to sit at home, or just creep about its precincts, be- cause she has not a single wing to fly with. In truth, a strange, homely-looking creature for a moth is this Lady Vapourer, with her great heavy brown body, making her seem all body and nothing else ; for not only wings, but even head, horns, legs each of which are of the smallest possible dimensions seem sacrificed to the formation of that bulky corporation^ a perfect sackful of eggs, which are actually discernible through the skin. 4 1 Sesia fusiformis 2 That of JEgerida. 3 Orgyla antiqua. 4 See vignette for figures of the " Vapourer," male and female. 280 MOTHS AS FEEDERS. With regard to one habit, that of feeding, our faineant flatterers widely differ. We have given a notion of the luxurious labours, in this way, of the honey-sipping " hawks " and sphinxes : and we have seen a T moth suck sugar for two hours on a stretch, dissolving it from the lump by a liquid let down through the tubular pipe wherewith he drew it up in syrup. Reaumur speaks of others which regaled on sweets from off his finger, " comme aurait pufaire un oiseau prive." To many, on the contrary, of the moth fraternity, eating would seem a thing not only undesired, but absolutely for- bidden, by the absence of any perceptible organ wherewith to eat. It is thus, amongst others, with the " Great Goat," the " Emperor," and the moth of the silk-worm, which latter, besides having no tongue to use, seldom takes the trouble to employ his wings. Thus is the most noted and useful of all " Moth Opera- tives," of all " Moth Idlers," one of the most pre-eminently lazv. 'j t'u-tins umii;uv.U 1'iui) flatterers The insects in this vignette are of the allied families Achetidce, Gryllidoi, and Locustidce. On the bank, beside its nest-hole, is a Field Cricket (Acheta campestris) . On the clover-leaves opposite sits a female grasshopper (Gryllus), with her sword-shaped ovipositor. Ascending the grass above is one of the small green LocustiJce, common in damp meadows ; and flying upwards in tho centre is the Acridium (or Locusta) subulatum, a species with very small elytra, figured in Curtis's " British Entomology." LOVERS OF PLEASURE. IFFERENT nations would seem to have as op- posite ideas about happiness as about beauty. The Japanese, for instance, have selected that half-dead liver of centuries, the tortoise, to figure their idea of perfect enjoyment, while a Grecian poet chose the grasshopper, so eminently a creature of life, living through every hour of its single summer, as a 282 GRASS AND TREE-HOPPERS. representative of surpassing bliss, deserving the apostrophe of "Happy insect! what can be In happiness compared to thee?" But know you not, says the entomologist, that these lines of Anacreon have been only by error and mistranslation assigned to the English grasshopper, at cost of the Grecian tree-hopper, to whom they properly belong? True; but if we examine, somewhat entomologically ', the well-known ode commencing with the. above couplet, we shall perhaps find that each of the attributes, real or figurative, which it assigns to the classic song- ster of the tree, suit as well, and some of them much better, our rustic songster of the grass. This felicity, without pretending to decide on its compaia- tive or positive amount, we may fairly suppose to be tolerably equal with the hoppers of the tree and of the grass. " Fed with nourishment divine, The dewy morning's gentle wine. Nature waits upon thee still, And thy verdant cup does fill ; 'Tis filled wherever thou dost tread, Nature's self thy Ganymede ! " This may be said no less truly than prettily of both our sum- mer minstrels, only with reservation. Both, doubtless, take a similar delight in quaffing the " morning's gentle wine," the one, from the emerald salver of a leaf, the other, from the golden chalice of a buttercup ; but, as vegetable feeders, both of no mean appetite, this "nourishment divine" would, by itself, serve them only poorly. And as for the tree-hopper, one of the uses of the gimlet-like tool with which it is provided is said to be that of tapping trees, after the manner of house- wives tapping birches for their sappy wine. Be it noticed, however, by the way, that neither foreigner nor native are vocal, but, in reality instrumental performers. Thus considered, the grasshopper is as a shepherd with his Pandean reeds, or pipe and tabor, and the tree-hopper, by all INSECTS AS PROPRIETORS. 283 accounts, as a deafening bagpiper his shrilly clamour audible, it is said, at a mile's distance. As for being " happier than the happiest king," the poet might have chosen, we imagine, a happier expression to ex- press the supreme felicity of his monarch of the trees, sup- posing, that is, the amount of happiness comprised within the golden circlet of a crown to be no bigger than philosophers, and poets also, have usually considered it. In the undisputed range of their several territories, whether of foliage or of grass, our two appropriators may be reckoned much upon a par; though he of the tree can certainly, from his loftier position, boast of a wider and more absolute com- mand. For this reason (considering both as kings) King Tree- hopper may be also, if not the happier, the safer of the two. As for the labours of man being made subservient to the insect's use, this certainly is a distinction which belongs much more properly to the grasshopper, " the landlord," if you will, of our meadows and our corn-fields, until at midsummer, or in harvest (his position reversed) he finds himself a tenant, forcibly ejected at the point of scythe or sickle. Here let us stop and compare, as applied to both our revellers of the sum- mer, the dictum of poet and the evidence of naturalist. First for judgment on the tree-hopper. The insect of Ana- creon might and may possibly be of more innoxious character ; but we are told by Stoll, that the common species of Tettix or Cicada, what he calls " La Cigale Vieilleme" does infinite injury to trees, especially to plantations of coffee, 1 by boring grooves and holes in the smaller branches, both for the depo- sition of eggs and for extracting juices. Now, Mr. Grasshopper! Are thy "joy" and "luxury" the joy and luxury of perfect innocence. On ocular evidence dost thou stand condemned. Each notch in the verdant, much more the withering blade, is as a mouth opened against thee in mute accusation. True, we hear and read but little of thy 1 At Surinam. K E 284 RAVAGES OF GRASS-HOPPERS. misdemeanours, while those of "the fly," 1 and "the wire- worm," 2 and "the grub," 3 are trumpeted loudly forth, and figure infamously in the "Newgate Calendar" of the indig- nant farmer. Yet do we suspect, that where thou and thy merry companions most abound, even in the meads of England, the mouthfuls of the cow must lack moisture, and the crops of hay lack weight ; and when we read of thy continental fellows caught in hand-nets by the bushel, what must we think of the amount of mischief committed, or likely to have been wrought, by the combination of their jaws! But, however deep the damage they effected, direful was the penalty they had to pay; when boiled, and their green coats reddened, like those of lobsters or of shrimps, they were served up, a friand repas, a dainty dish, to porkers. The poet to the tree-hopper thus concludes : " To thee of all things upon earth, Life is no longer than thy mirth ; Happy insect ! happy, thou Dost neither age nor winter know ; But when thou'st drunk and danced and sung Thy fill, the summer leaves among, Sated with thy summer feast, Thou retir'st to endless rest." This will do alike for the tree and the grass-hopper, since, with both, a short life and a merry one is the allotted condition of being, extended only, we believe, to a few weeks of summer or early autumn. Neither they, their leaves, nor grass, nor " flowers," are much exposed, therefore, to those " frosty fingers " deprecated for the gryllus by the Cavalier Lovelace (writer of our prefatory lines), who, with true cavalier philo- sophy (only a variation on the Greek Epicurean), thus con- cludes his address to the English grasshopper : " Poor verdant fool I and now green ice ; thy joys, Large and as lasting as thy perch of grass, 1 Aphides of the hop, so called. 2 Larva of the Click Beetle. 3 Larva of the Cockchafer. BRITISH CICADA. 285 Bid us lay in 'gainst winter rain, and poise Their floods with an overflowing glass." Anacreon's hopper of the tree, and our British hopper of the grass may now surely be allowed to share between them the former's celebrated ode, and the palm of happiness and song. Our sketch comparative may possibly have excited in some of our readers a desire to compare for themselves the persons and the merits of our insect professors of the "joyeuse science;" but this, with the tree-hopper, is no easy matter. The Tettix of ancient Greece, and Cicada of ancient and modern Italy, has a place indeed amongst British insects, but it has been rarely seen in England, and only, we believe, in the New Forest, whose shades, however, would not seem to have resounded with its song. Allied insects there nevertheless are, of English birth, some of them pretty, some of form remark- able, but none very likely to attract attention, for lack of size and song. There is, however, one species to be seen univer- sally on hedges and in gardens all through the summer, which, in shape and make, will help to give a notion of the true Cicada. Though the person of this diminutive tree-hopper, at least before it attains maturity, is screened in a singular manner from common observation, there is scarcely an insect of more easy discovery, when once we have penetrated the mystery of its white veil. Who has not noticed, about the time of the cuckoo's welcome advent, the leaves of hawthorn, hazel, wood- bine the leaves, in short, of almost every common shrub and plant in hedge and garden beginning to be besprinkled with frothy masses, which they know, probably, by the familiar appellation of "cuckoo-spit?" Let them examine for them- selves, and they will find, imbedded in the centre of each frothy "flocon," a little green, black-eyed insect, 1 from whose body the froth is none other than a secretion, intended, it would seem, to cover and protect its wingless infancy. If 1 Teltigonia, or Cicada spumaria, Cuckoo-spit Frog-hopper. 286 RAPID TRANSFORMATIONS. removed by violence, this frothy veil is gradually renewed ; but as its little wearer approaches maturity it becomes curtailed and thinner. Then is our time, if we wish to acquire from this Tom Thumb of tree-hoppers some slender notion of his com- paratively gigantic relative, the Grecian Singer, to pluck him, with leaf and branch, from his native tree, and set him up under a glass for inspection or exhibition. The veil of froth having shrunk to a film, we shall then discern, as each part of the insect emerges from a previous skin, first, a large, flat, frog-shaped head, with eyes set wide apart ; then a triangular neck or shoulder-piece, flanked by small protuberances, which might seem apologies for wings j and, lastly, a short annulated body, pointed at the extremity. Six legs, of which the hinder pair, more strong and lengthy than their fellows, bespeak endowments of a leaping character, will complete, to all appearance, the somewhat grotesque figure of our little tree- hopper, or frog-hopper, as he is more generally called. But, though thus unveiled and thus uncased (his skin perfect even to the legs, left behind him in silvery emptiness, like a shadow of his former self) we shall yet have to wait a little longer before we can behold him altogether a thing complete. He lacks not wings, only his wings want expansion ; but, after about ten minutes, occupied in their unfolding from out the little shoulder-knots which yet encase them, will appear, in readiness for flight, two large transparent pinions, defended outwardly by a pair of less delicate texture. When the latter have put on their colours, most often variegated brown and white, behold a final and ample finish to the exterior of our frog-hopper, who, as soon as released from crystal durance, will afford, in agile spring, half-flight, half-leap, an ocular demonstration of the fitness of his name. 1 One of the largest and most conspicuous, both for size arid song, of our native grasshoppers, is the " Large Green ;" 2 with 1 See Vignette to " Insect Minstrelsy." 2 Acrida viridlssima. Vignette to " Insect Minstrelsy." CANNIBAL GRASSHOPPERS. 287 rather a sharp head, large prominent eyes, ample wings, and slender antennae as long as the body. This noble of his tribe is not an unfrequent resorter to hedges and marshy places ; and, though his green armour may easily escape observation, his loud chirping can hardly fail to attract notice, especially amidst the general silence of the feathered choir, in the songless months of August and September. The above grandee of grasshoppers, as well as his more insignificant brethren, is in the frequent habit of filling up idle pauses between his music and his meals by a sort of seeming rumination, which many have considered an actual chewing of the cud ; whereas it is opined by others, that, instead of ruminating, like Mistress Colly, the Sieur Gryllus thinks of nothing but of licking, like Miss Grimalkin, his superb whiskers (otherwise antennae) and his paws an operation performed, by the way, with a tongue not at all dissimilar in the shape to the unruly member boasted by ourselves. Whether or not chewers of the cud, grasshoppers are, decidedly, crop- pers of the grass ; but we are assured, on good authority, that they now and then are nothing scrupulous in the variation of such Brahminian fare, by taking, as a relish, some innocent little insect of a kind differing from themselves ; still worse, that when made fellow-prisoners (hard pressed by hunger or confinement) they have been known to commit the cannibal enormity of devouring one another an example being given wherein one of the gentler sex (which, by the way, among in- sects is usually the fiercer) was the doer of the deed. But, worst of all ! horror of horrors ! we have it on excellent evidence, how that a certain great green grasshopper (one of the sort just described) on being bottled up together with his own leg (accidentally detached), did make a hearty meal off that late portion of himself. The reverend naturalist by whom this unnatural act is recorded, performed himself, what in some prejudiced opinions might appear a crowning feat of horror. He followed the example of the Acridopkagi, and pronounced, 288 CRICKETS. on experience, the large green grasshopper of England to be " an excellent condiment." The Cricket, like the grasshopper, has long slender antennae, but is distinguished from the latter by a thick roundish head, instead of one more or less pointed. The most generally known of the Achetidce, or Cricket family, in England, are those called the " Domestic," the " Field," and the " Mole." We have long ago described briefly the most salient points in the character of the fire-side chirper. His country cousin of the field is, like himself, known much more generally by sound than sight ; for, being of a shy, unso- cial temper, it is not often that we can get a peep (except by stratagem) at his black, gold-striped, shining jacket, or at the more duskily-coloured and more portly person of his female partner, who wears the pacific sword of a " sauterelle a sabre." No sooner are these timid little animals warned by their long antennal ears, directed to all quarters like those of a hare, that footsteps are approaching, than, forthwith ceasing their chirp, they pop down into their holes among the grass, at the mouths of which they usually take up their stations. After having essayed in vain to dislodge them by the spade from their subterranean citadels, it was found by Mr. White that the insertion of a straw or pliant bit of grass would probe the windings of their caverns, and bring to upper air the poor disquieted inhabitants. In a somewhat similar manner French children are said to fish for field crickets with long line ; of horsehair, baited with an ant. Early in March, the field cricket, with wings as yet covered in their cases, and so enveloped till the month of April, opens his cell's mouth, and, sitting at its entrance, sings, or, to speak more correctly, plays through the summer days and nights, on to August, when all trace of him, audible and visible, disappears, with the obliteration even of the entrance to his late abode. 1 See Vignette. LOCUSTS. 289 The field-cricket, like the grasshopper, is accustomed to fill up pauses in his music by licking, ever and anon, his feet and whiskers with his rounded tongue, which, together with his jaws, is of course employed also, at other intervals, upon something of more edible description, in the way of breakfast, dinner, or supper. The family of Locustida (locusts), though, as before noticed, often confounded with that of Gryllidce (grasshoppers), are distinguishable from them by the inferior length of their antennae, which are generally shorter by half than the body ; also, by the absence in the female insect of the sword-shaped instrument employed, where given, to inter eggs within the ground. 1 That prince of insect destroyers, the migratory locust, has appeared occasionally in Great Britain and in the environs of Paris, as well as in Southern Europe. 1 See Vignette. liint iUV:vf it miff nnb tTiou bost .'vtujt On a. currant-leaf in the foreground lies a caterpillar of the Magpie Moth {Abraxas grossulariata), which has been pierced by a small Ichneumon (Micro- yaster glomeratus), black, with yellow legs, of which a magnified figure appears flying upwards on the left. Its parasitic larva?, having fed upon the juices of the caterpillar, have deserted its body, and spun around it their ovate silk cocoons. Above these, descending on the right, is the large common Ichneu- mon (Pimpla manifestator) ; and high in the corner opposite ascends another large specie?, black and orange, of the genus Ophion. PARASITES. " a plague, The better fed, the longer kept." HERE is a certain destructive tribe of insects which may be seen everywhere; and they may be seen not only now, but at almost every season. The varied species of insects which com- pose this tribe differ widely both in magnitude and in strength ; but they are, one and all, according to their power, active, PARASITIC INSECTS. 291 prying, and destructive. They are specious in outward form, but they are for ever watching opportunities to make breaches in the citadel of life, that they may introduce therein, sometimes a single assassin, sometimes a murderous host, which sap its foundations, and bring it, sooner or later, to destruction. Ichneumon is the name generally applied to the parasitic race of which we have been speaking. There are, however, various insects of parasitic habits which are not properly ich- neumons, though the name, as signifying pryers, does not ill befit them. The original ichneumon of antiquity was, as most people are aware, no insect at all, but a little four-footed animal, a pryer after, and devourer of, crocodiles' eggs, on which account it was adorned by the deifying people of Egypt as among their benefactors ; and amongst others, we are bound, cer- tainly, to rank its insect namesakes, prying as they do, for our benefit, after caterpillars in the egg as well as in maturity. But the extensive value of ichneumons, a check upon caterpillar depredation, may be best estimated by their num- bers, of which we may form a tolerable notion when we hear of above 1300 species 1 in Europe only, some so minute "that the egg of a butterfly is sufficient for the support of two [individuals] until they reach maturity; others so large that the body^)f a full-grown caterpillar does not more than suffice for one." 2 The ichneumons belong to the same order (that of Hy- menopterd) as wasps and bees ; both, spite of their relation- ship, among the objects of their treacherous attack. Of this distant kinship there are outward traces in the four transparent wings, and in the slight wasp-like attachment of ichneumon's breast and abdomen, also in its prevailing colours of black and orange; but the ichneumon, whether 1 "Naturalist's Library." 2 Kirby and Spence, Introduction. 292 ICHNEUMON BOEERS. a dwarf or a giant of its family, has a figure of such peculiar cut as to make it easy enough, when acquainted with one, to recognize a hundred of his name. We may know them by their long narrow bodies, so convenient for prying and poking into holes and corners, as well as by their long, flexible, jointed horns, so continually on the vibrate as to have pro- cured for their possessors the appellation of Muscce vibrantes. With these organs l (supposed to combine the uses of feelers and of ears) our pry ere are to be seen for ever exploring, both by touch and hearing, the places and the living subjects best suited to receive their eggs. Cuckoo-flies is another appellation by which ichneumons are distinguished, because, like the cuckoo, they are accus- tomed, lazily, intrusively, dishonestly, and cruelly, to deposit their eggs in stranger nests sometimes within stranger egg- shells sometimes within the bodies of stranger grubs and caterpillars, either in their infancy or when they have attained their growth. For execution of these her nefarious practices, the female ichneumon is provided with a very conspicuous instrument, tail-like, seeming composed sometimes of one, sometimes of three divergent hairs, but consisting, in fact, of a single ovipositor or borer, with a sheath longitudinally divided and opening like a pair of compasses. The nicest adaptation marks this curious instrument, which, according to the different species and habits of its possessor, is employed to pierce, sometimes only an exposed egg, some- times the skin of a grub, caterpillar, or chrysalis, and some- times through defences strong and deep, coverings of silk, or wood, or clay ; and, according to these varied requisitions, it is shorter or longer, thinner or thicker, stiffer or more pliant. In one large and common ichneumon, 2 easily known by her black body, red legs, and smoke-coloured wings, spotted at the base, this tail-like appendage reaches into inches, some- 1 Antennas. a Pimpla manifestator. A LIVING MARTYRDOM. 293 times nearly three a length extreme, as longer than the body, but not superfluous, seeing that its office is often to penetrate, and that through a barrier of clay, down to the very bottom of deep nest-holes in walls or sand-banks, those, usually, of the mason wasp, wherein, to the destruction of the hapless nestling, its rightful occupant, it leaves behind the fatal deposit of a parasitic egg. Let us see now though no very pleasant thing to look upon or think of the way in which the ichneumon often goes to work upon a poor devoted devourer of the leaves of cabbage, one of the commonest of all caterpillars, whence spring one of the commonest of all butterflies the Large White l of the garden. While stuffing its variegated doublet of green, black, and yel- low, with vegetable pulp, a small ichneumon, a little four-winged imp, with black body and yellow legs, pounces on its back, flourishes her tremendous egg-inserting weapon, and, seeking therewith the caterpillar's most vulnerable part, plunges it, now here, now there, between its rings, leaving, with every puncture, a " thorn in the flesh," soon to be the living prey of a brood of devourers. The victim of this infliction bears all with a most asto- nishing degree of quietude ; and, without any outward signs of the visitation which has befallen it, continues to discuss its cabbage with apparently the same relish as before, and utterly unconscious that, while seeming only to feed itself, it is in reality supporting the surreptitious progeny which Mother Ichneumon has so cunningly committed to its most involuntary keeping. Thus strangely supported, the infant or grub cuckoo-flies attain their growth, and so, to all appearance, does their un- fortunate fosterer, the caterpillar. According to instinctive custom, the latter, then deserting its cabbage, betakes 1 Pontia Bmssicce. F F 294 PARASITIC COCOONS. itself, perhaps in July or August, to the sheltering coping of a garden wall, or cross-bar of a paling; places where, in the common course of nature, it is accustomed to discard the caterpillar and put on the chrysalis form. We have happened, perhaps, to see a caterpillar, visited as just described, ascend its wall or paling. In a day or two, perhaps in a few hours, we see it again, still a caterpillar, and alive, but reduced almost to an empty skin, while heaped around it is a mass of little oval cocoons of yellow silk. By some people these might be taken for the caterpillars' eggs ; by others, for a specimen of its own spinning ; and they might suppose, moreover, that it had worked so hard as well-nigh to work itself to death ; but no such thing the yellow silken cases have been spun by the little brood of parasites. One most noteworthy circumstance in the above and other parasitic infestations of a similar kind, is the avoidance, by the ichneumon devourers, of every vital part of the cater- pillar devoured, whose living juices are requisite for their support. Incipient moths, as well as butterflies, are continually being defrauded of their winged estate through the agency of ich- neumon, and sometimes other parasites. During last August, we had six of the golden chrysalides of the little tortoise-shell butterfly all suspended to a cluster of nettles which we had planted in a flower-pot for the provision of their caterpillars. From two of the number appeared duly, in all their bright array of black and scarlet, blue and gold, the insects to be naturally expected ; from the third issued a brood of small ichneumons. Of the fourth, fifth, and sixth, the " gold coats " assumed a questionable blackness, and being hence led to examine how they might be filled, we found, instead of the wrinkled wings and folded members of butterfly occupants, three little brown barrels within each, which we presently recognized for the pupa? of two-winged flies; and from these accordingly came forth nine as ordinary-looking ICHNEUMONS IN CHRYSALIDES. 295 little animals of that description as were ever set eyes on buzzing in a window, distinguished, however, by their para- sitic origin from the household herd. Though the gay and beautiful order Lepidoptera thus holds a dangerous pre-eminence as an object of parasitic attack, it is not alone the butterfly and moth which are often robbed by the same agency of their last estate and brightest in- heritance. We have seen already how a common ichneumon, with a tail-like ovipositor of prodigious length, is accustomed to assail, in the deep nest-hole of a mason wasp, the infant progeny of an insect of its own order, that of Hymenoptera ; and we shall briefly notice, now, the invasion of an infant asylum of somewhat similar construction, wherein, however, a parasitic wasp is the aggressor, and a solitary carpenter bee the maternal guardian, whose cares are often rendered nuga- tory by its cunning. The waspish lady (in this case the aggressor) is, however, we can tell you, Reader, a wasp of no common order; but one which, for beauty and splendour, has never met her match in the waspish world, nor her superior, perhaps, in the whole world of British insects. You must surely have sometimes seen her, a perfect living jewel as she is ! with head, breast, and shoulders all thickly set with emeralds, outshone only by the ruby-red and burnished gold which mingle in her fiery tail. You must have seen, and certainly have noted, such a notable as this, when alighted, according to her wont, in the hottest summer sunshine, upon posts and railings; but you may not know her by the names either of " Chrysis" of " Golden Wasp," or of " Ruby-tail Fly ;" or even if you know her names, you may not be acquainted with her busi- ness her business, that is, upon posts and railings. Never suppose that she so often visits these uninviting, flowerless, dry localities, merely to bask in the sultry sunbeams, or challenge them to outshine her golden splendour. No ; this 296 THE GOLDEN WASPS. creature, in her glorious array, is bent on glorious mischief. You may, one day, happen to perceive, on the same post a? that chosen for her station by the golden wasp, a hole bored in the wood, and you may also possibly see its borer, in the shape of a little bee mother, of the carpenter craft, who, with infinite pains and labour, has chiselled out with her jaws a nursery tunnel, divided into cells, and stored it with provisions for her young. But, ah ! that bejewelled ruby-tailed pryer has also watched her in her tender labours, which she will take good care to convert, if possible, to the benefit of her own waspish offspring. No sooner does she issue from her nest-hole, than the wily parasite darts from behind her screen, her dazzling body and glittering wings flash for a moment in the sun, then suddenly are lost in the dark perforation of the tunnelled bee's nest. Woe then to its hapless tenants ! They may feast awhile upon the sweets provided by maternal care ; but only to be devoured by a grub of the golden wasp, who, in her visit to their nest (fatal as it is brief), has deposited an egg, or eggs, from whence will issue all this murderous mischief. While the infant bee, deep in its perforated cell, is exposed to dangers such as these, the embryo gall-fly sleeps not a whit more safely within its pulpy or woody globe, pierced, often, to the centre by the egg-inserting instrument of a gall ichneumon. Even the little aphis, or plant-louse, cannot escape, through its minuteness, from the punctures of an ichneumon parasite pro- portioned to itself; and the aphides' arch enemy, the ladybird, while yet an aphis-eating larva, is preyed upon in turn by a parasitic consumer. All the parasites above noticed, if not ichneumon, are, be it remembered, flies, parasite flies, either four-winged, of the order Hymenoptera, or two -winged, of the order Diptera. They are all, also, when arrived as perfect insects at their winged estates, livers upon vegetable food, for themselves, usually, mere harmless sippers of honey. Only in the parental character are their cruel and parasitic propensities developed, to A WILY PARASITE. 297 be exercised either on living subjects, affording at once a cover for their eggs and nourishment for their young, or else upon those stranger nests wherein is to be found both shelter and a store of living prey suitable for the same purposes. But there are certain other insect parasites (chiefly wingless, and of the order Aptera) which are parasitic entirely for them- selves, perfect insects which infest others, perfect also. Of such are the Acari, or mites, with which all, who have ever noticed the commonest of black beetles, must have sometimes seen them covered, as well as their pretty cousins the gold green chafers of the rose. The humble bee is anpther not unfrequent sufferer from somewhat similar infestation, which is said, moreover, to rob, occasionally, the merry grasshopper of his juices, if not of his enjoyment. These, however, with other parasite tormentors whose visitations extend to bird, and beast, and man, may be looked on more properly as a part of the vermin crew, not now the subject of our notice. In the foreground is an Earwig (Forficula vulgaris), surrounded by her brood as a hen by her chickens. Above, on the leaf of a rose-bush, is an out-door Spider (a beautiful species, white with crimson markings), keeping guard over her numerous eggs, enveloped in a covering of bluish silk. The leaf behind her has been converted by her industry into a nest, from which, with her eggs, she is supposed to have been dislodged. On the wooden pale opposite is the excavated nest, with enclosed cocoons of a mother "Carpentress," amongst the solitary wasps (Eumenes), who is flying up towards it. On one of the leaflets of the rose above it is a Leaf-cutter Bee (Megachile centuncularis), employed in excision of one of the circular pieces used in the lining of her nest ; ar.d above flies another of the same "Upholsterer" craft. INSTINCTS OF MATERNITY. THE POPPY BEE. HE subject of our opening remarks belongs to one of those solitary, that is to say, not social, tribes which, from their ingenious manner of fitting up or furnishing their nests, have acquired the name of " Upholsterers," or Leaf cutters ;" the popular designation of " Poppy " being NEST OF THE POPPY BEE. 299 derived from the material employed for her work by this par- ticular species. It is doubted by Kirby and Spence whether the poppy bee is a native of Britain ; but the author of " Insect Architecture " ' is almost certain of having seen the nests of her species in Scotland. We shall give from the latter an interest- ing description of a tunnelled nursery, formed, arid hung, and furnished by one of these little maternal artificers. " One of these holes is about three inches deep, gradually widening as it descends, till it assumes the form of a small Florence flask. The interior of this excavation is rendered smooth, uniform, and polished, in order to adapt it to the tapestry with which it is intended to be hung, and which is the next step in the process. " The material used for tapestry by this insect upholsterer is supplied by the flower-leaves of the scarlet field-poppy, from which she successively cuts off small oval pieces, seizes them between- her legs, and conveys them to the nest. She begins her work at the bottom, which she overlays with three or four leaves in thickness, and the sides have never less than two. When she finds that the piece she has brought is too large to fit the place intended, she cuts off what is superfluous and carries away the shreds. By cutting the fresh petal of a poppy with a pair of scissors, we may perceive the difficulty of keep- ing the piece free from wrinkles and shrivelling ; but the bee knows how to spread the pieces which she uses as smooth as " When she has in this manner hung the little chamber round with this splendid scarlet tapestry, of which she is not sparing, but extends it even beyond the entrance, she then fills it with the pollen of flowers mixed with honey, to the height of about half an inch. In this magazine of provisions for her future progeny she lays an egg, and, over it, folds down the tapestry of poppy petals from above. The upper part is then filled in with earth." 2 1 Rennie. 2 " Insect Architecture." 300 LEAF-CUTTER BEE. Another industrious member of the " upholsterer" craft, and one which, as a common native of England, may be more easily observed in carrying on her business, is another little bee called the Rose Leaf-cutter. From June to August there are often to be found on rose- trees certain leaves out of which have been cut one or more pieces of circular or oval form, and that with as much smooth- ness and regularity as if with a pair of scissors. 1 These exci- sions are, in fact, evidences indubitable that the scissor-like jaws of the bee sempstress have been busily at work, and, by watching quietly at hand, it is not unlikely that we may see the industrious little body busy at her cutting out. To follow her as she carries her work home may be more difficult, at least on some occasions, but not on all, as her chamber and de- signed nursery may happen to be in a gravel-walk, an old wall, or an old post, as likely to be close by as far off. Be it where it may, it consists generally of a cylindrical excavated hole, of which the site once discovered, the interior art and mystery may easily be brought to light by help of a spade or other adapted instrument. In truth, though, to disturb thus the labour of love exercised by this little artisan would give us pain hardly to be balanced by gratified wonder at the skill and neatness wherewith she has fitted up her leaf-lined nest. We mean not to say, indeed, (and what lover of entomology would be credited if he did?) that tenderness would be certain, in our own case, to master curiosity on discovery, for the first time, of a leaf-cutter's abode, or on other the like occasion ; but those from whom the maternal upholsterer is likely to meet with more consideration may obtain, without invading her nursery, a very excellent notion of the style of its fitting up. This they may acquire from pages much more accurately descriptive than ours; 2 but in the meantime we may briefly tell them how that, having excavated or found her hole, (a cavity in ground, or wood, or wall, of from six to ten inches 1 See Vignette. ' Reaumur; also " Insect Architecture." LEAF-CUTTER'S NEST. 301 deep,) she proceeds to construct within it, of the pieces of leaf she cuts off, several cells, of the shape and about the size of a thimble, which she inserts, successively, the bottom of one into the mouth of that below it. It takes from nine to twelve pieces of leaf to complete each single cell, and as each is finished, she stores it with a rose-coloured conserve made chiefly of pollen, and honey collected from flowers of the thistle. When to this magazine of sweets is superadded the egg from whence its future consumer is to spring, the provident provider of the store covers in the whole with three more pieces of leaf cut in a circle as truly accurate as compasses could describe; room being left above this cover for insertion of a succeeding cell, our " upholsterer " thus proceeds till her nursery tunnel is completely fitted up. Well might the gardener of Reaumur, on accidentally un- earthing such a work of wonder as this nest of the leaf-cutter bee, suppose it, in his ignorance, the work of some magician ! The wool or down of pubescent plants, such as rose campion and cat's-ear, shaven off and " rolled up like a ribbon " for convenient transport, is used by another rather common species of solitary bee, 1 to compose, not the lining or compartments, but the exterior covering of her nest, which is plastered within, and provided, like those before mentioned, with a store of suitable provision. Bee "carpenters" and bee "masons" all working with maternal views, and named, like the " upholsterers," from the character of their labours show no less ingenuity and perse- verance in the employment of their more solid materials. The masons construct their nests, some with sand, some with earth and mingled chalk, some with earth and wood, uniting by gluten their grains or fragments. The carpenters chisel their cells out of posts and palings a little softened by decay ; and a nest of this description has been found, when cut open by a curious observer, 2 to consist of 1 Anthidium manicatum. 3 Rennie, " Insect Architecture." 302 MOTHERS AMONG WASPS. a tunnel excavated in the wood, and divided by thin partitions of clay into five or six compartments, each with its supply of pollen for the single inhabitant who is to emerge from the egg deposited therein. 1 Besides these, there are bee " miners," which, as their name imports, excavate galleries, for their nurseries, in the earth. These artisans amongst solitary bees have sisters in nearly all their crafts amongst the solitary wasps, many of which latter work no less expertly than the former in their different styles of maternally-designed architecture. 2 Nor are these waspish mothers a whit behindhand in providing for their nestlings' necessities, only showing their fiercer propensities in the nature of the food provided which, in place of a ^eap of pollen, is usually a pile of flies or gnats, and sometimes, as in the case of the wasp " mason," a spiral column of living caterpillars, or a brace or two of live spiders. On these, the number of which is nicely calculated to meet his wants, the young wasp is nourished up to perfect wasphood, unless, spite of his mother's labours so cunningly protective, he himself fall a prey to the usurping offspring of some ichneumon- fly, who, more clever still, has contrived, cuckoo-like, to lay her egg within the nest he occupies. One species of mason-wasp, mentioned by Bonnett, ap- proaches nearer than any of the above to the feathered race in her mode of supplying her young, for instead of enclosing at once within her nursery larder a store sufficient to supply the future exigencies of its inmate, she, from time to time, carries thither a living caterpillar, opening arid reclosing the nest for her entrance and exit. The prescriptive skill and care exhibited by solitary bees and wasps in the construction of their nurseries is probably, as with birds in the building of their nests, entirely of an instinctive character ; but we must assign, surely, one of a higher description to certain other features of insect maternity, with a few of which we shall conclude our imperfect sketch. 1 See Vignette. a See Vignette. BROODING EARWIGS. 303 This love of offspring does not seem the most strongly developed in the mild and gentle of the insect tribes, but in those, especially, of fierce and predatory habits, as the cruel spider, the devouring water-scorpion, the already-noticed murderous wasp, and the, occasionally, cannibal earwig. It might not so much excite our wonder to find the large feathery wings of the soft and beautiful butterfly, or those of the downy moth, spread, dove-like, over their eggs or infant broods, to hatch or cherish them. These, indeed, are not without their maternal instincts wonderfully displayed. The butterfly deserts her delicate repast among the flowers to de- posit her eggs on the (to herself) uninviting cabbage, which is to support her progeny ; and the moth, in one or more in- stances, 1 strips the down from her own body to defend her brood against the winter's cold j but if we want a parallel to the patience, the care, and affection of a brooding hen, we must look for it in the harsh, sharp, linear form of the earwig. De Geer tells us (his observations being confirmed by later naturalists) that she absolutely sits upon her eggs, as if to hatch them, and guards them with the greatest care ; if scat- tered, collects them one by one into a heap, then resumes and assiduously maintains her sitting. When hatched, her nest- lings, like those of a hen, creep under her, and are thus some- times brooded for hours by the mother insect. 2 We have had an opportunity of observing for ourselves the brooding care of these insect Partlets, as exemplified in one which we transported from her nest beside a stone, and com- mitted, with half a dozen of her white progeny, to the keeping of an inverted glass. Knowing that, in spite of an occasional penchant for a living subject, the usual food of earwigs con- sists of flowers, we put a blossom of dandelion into our pri- soner's coop of crystal a piece of consideration for which we were amply repaid by seeing Mother Earwig commence, forth- 1 That of the Gipsy Moth ; also the Gold-tail. 2 See Vignette. G G 304 OTHER HEN-LIKE INSECTS. with, upon one of the yellow petals, which, directly afterward?, was attacked, at the bitten edge, by the tender jaws of one of her surrounding brood, thus led, apparently, to the repast which she seemed to have prepared for their more easy discussion. The egg-bearing water-scorpion displays even more attach- ment for her eggs than birds, for she never leaves them until hatched, carrying them always in a cluster on her back. The cochineal insects, of which one species affords the well-known dye, protect their eggs by covering them with their own life- less bodies. Some of these little animals, with their eggs thus curiously guarded, and embedded in a white cottony secre- tion, are to be found on grape-vines, too commonly for the gardener, especially near London. The hawthorn furnishes, in another coccus, another instance of frequent occurrence, in which the body of the mother insect, dried to a silvery grey skin, is to be seen protecting from winter's cold a multi- tude of her orange-coloured eggs. The two habitudes last named bear, certainly, most of the instinctive character, but at all events they are poetic in idea. Perhaps, however, none of the maternal traits above noted are so strongly marked as those wont to be exhibited by a species of spider common under clods of earth, and often seen carrying her eggs in a white silken bag fastened to the end of her body. " No miser," says Kirby, " clings to his treasure with more solicitude than this spider to her bag. She carries it with her everywhere. If you deprive her of it, she makes the most strenuous efforts for its recovery. If you restore it, her actions demonstrate her joy. She seizes it, and with the utmost agility runs off with it to a place of security. " When the proper time arrives, she makes an opening in the bag for the young to come forth, when they run in clusters on her back and legs ; she carries them about with her, and feeds them till able to help themselves." 1 Bonnet's relation concerning an individual of the same 1 " Introduction to Entomology." SOCIAL MATERNITY. 305 species affords a striking parallel to those often recorded of cats, tigers, and bears, when robbed of their young. To put her affection to the test, he threw her into the pit of a large ant-lion, in the sand. The fierce creature seized her bag, when she struggled till its fastening gave way. She then regained it with her jaws, but by superior strength he pulled it into the sand, into which, rather than forsake her treasure, she suffered herself to be dragged also. Bonnet forced her from it, but, though repeatedly pulled away, she would not leave the spot. Many other species of the spider race have shown themselves scarcely inferior in maternal attachment. Now with reference to ants, as well as social bees and social wasps, we must here notice, that the maternal instincts and affections reign paramount, through life, in the working popu- lation of the ant-hill and the hive, with which, in fact, love of their young forms the very mainspring of activity. tin- Vrtmtn of ttijtt:s cfeuaftim .->: Ascending the tombstone to the right, is the Churchyard Beetle (Slaps mortisaga'), distinguished by its intense blackness. Next, on the ground below, is a small, black, shining Dung Beetle (one of the Histeridae) ; and adjacent, a pair of black and orange Necrophori, notable for their industry in interment of animal remains. Climbing the grass above, is the Silpha quadri- punctata, a black and yellow feeder upon carrion ; and in descending flight, les- sened by distance, is that most common of beetle scavengers, the Dor, or Clock Geotrupes stercorarius). latter The THE SCARAB^US AND ITS MODERN WORSHIPPERS. HAT a striking contrast is there between the two insects which figure most conspicuously in the annals of antiquity the butterfly and the dung-beetle ! The former was regarded by the ancients as an emblem of the soul, the was made by them an object of soul's worship, one, all beauty, vivacity, and buoyancy; having no THE EGYPTIAN SCARAB^US. 315 business in life but pleasure no habitation but among the beautiful flowers, and breathing the perfumed air of summer. The other, in form dark and repulsive, in habits dull and laborious; its abode beneath the earth, or within the loathsome substances which cumber earth's surface, and its favourite atmosphere one of steaming fetidity thence exhaled. Yet this, the Scarabceus sacer, or Sacred Beetle, was the creature which the wise and civilized Egyptians imaged on their sepulchral monuments, enclosed with their embalmed bodies, carved on their lofty columns, inscribed on their astro- nomical tables, looked on as symbolic of the world, and of the glorious sun, nay, adored as a visible deity ! This insect was also more especially the symbol of their goddess Neith, whose attribute was supreme power in govern- ing the works of creation, and whose glory was considered to be increased rather than diminished by the presence of another power named Phta, the Creator. As typical of Neith, the insect was carved or painted on rings, and worn by soldiers, in token of homage to that Power which disposeth the fate of battles. The modern representative of the Scarabcpus sacer (imported from Africa into southern Europe) is the Pill-Beetle, so named from its practice of moulding round pellets of dung, depositing an egg in each, and then, by the assistance of the hind legs and extremity of the body, rolling them backwards into a deep hole, previously excavated for their reception. If one of the insects finds itself inadequate, alone, to the performance of this task, it is accustomed to call in and obtain the assistance of one or more of its fellows. This, certainly, is a habit suffi- ciently remarkable to attract attention from the least obser- vant, and, as one of Nature's uncommon wonders, it formed, in times of superstition, a convenient peg whereon to hang a tissue of embroidered fiction. The Egyptians, accordingly, were wont to regard these insect labours as symbolizing those of Osiris and the Sun ; the balls of dung were exalted into H H 316 THE MODERN SCARAB^US. types of the world, and, the beetles being supposed to push them always from east to west, for twenty-eight successive days, their movement was made also to represent that of the habitable globe. To carry out this symbolic scheme, the Scaraba3us (reckoning five joints to each of its six feet) was said to have thirty fingers, corresponding with the number of days in each sign of the zodiac ; while, to complete the analogy, the six notches or angular projections of the insect's head were likened to the rays of the sun. 1 The Scarabaeus was never, that we know of, made in Eng- land a recipient exactly of divine honours ; yet would it appear that this, or a beetle of similar habits, held no mean place in the estimation of one at least among our ancestors, and in times comparatively recent. Mouffet, one of the fathers of ento- mology, is loud in praise of its virtues, which (according to him) should serve as a stimulant to every good quality, should invite to labour, temperance, prudence, justice, modesty, and should teach man contentment, by showing him how a beetle can luxuriate in a bed of dung, just as well as in a bed of roses. How justice should have a place in this catalogue of virtues to be learnt from beetle practice, puzzles us, we confess, to discover ; nor may it be worth the trouble of inquiry. Per- haps it would better suit our purpose to see whether this once worshipped and lauded Scarabasus has sunk, in these modern times, into utter disregard ; or whether amongst those who, perhaps, know him not by name, there may not be found a considerable number who, inasmuch as they follow his ways, may be said still to worship his image. Where, at all events, shall we find a better emblem, if not a better god, for the busy of the money-making, money-loving world, living immersed in filthy lucre, than the dung-abiding beetle ? Like it, are they not for ever toiling, from rise to set of sun, to amass and roll together their corrupt riches? And ' Latreille, " Annales du Museum," 1819. " Des Inscctes peintes ousculptes sur les Monumens de 1'Egypte." THE CLOCK BEETLE. 317 for what purpose? Not to diffuse, but to bury them, even as ihe beetle, in the earth of their sordid selfishness. Verily, shade of Sir Thomas Gresham, thou princely mer- chant ! save but for respect for thee, and for the remnant of nobler traders which, with the baser sort, are now wont to assemble in the modern halls surmounted by thy ancient grass- hopper, we would even tear down that classic, youthful, rural, mirth-loving insect, and set up, in its stead, a gigantic Scara- baeus, which, stripped of its fabulous, but clothed in all its veracious attributes, would be, of all symbols, most appropriate to surmount a temple of Mammon. The sacred beetle of Egypt is not a native of Britain, and only of Europe as naturalized in its southern countries from the neighbouring continent of Africa. But though we have not a Scardbceus sacer in the list of our indigenous beetles, we have an insect greatly resembling it in form as well as. habits, which may be met with almost everywhere, and on every day from March to October. This is no other than the " great dor/ 7 or " clock" the " shardborne beetle" of our immortal Bard, that which, on summer and autumn evenings, so often with drowsy hum wheels lumbering past us, or bangs up right against us. Like the Scarabaeus, this clock-beetle 1 is, in figure, broad, and short, and clumsy. His forehead has none, indeed, of those sun-like rays, in plainer language, none of those vandyked notches which distinguish that of the Egyptian, but it is adorned, like the latter, with a pair of horns, 2 finished by laminated or leafy tips. Black, in both insects, is the prevail- ing hue, at least on the upper side ; but in our dor, the wing- cases are tinted on their margins with bright violet, while the legs and whole of the under surface are cased in armour of steely blue, glossed with green and purple. The exterior, indeed, of this dweller in defilement is far from unpleasing, 1 See Vignette ; Clock Beetle, Gcotnipes stercorarius. 2 Antennae. 318 THE DOR BEETLE. and he is remarkable, as well as others of his tribe, for absence of all unsightly traces of his habits or resorts. To look at the unsullied polish of his mail, one might sup- pose him risen, like the green gold-chafer, from a bed of roses; whereas, being a true Scarabaeus in nature, if not in name, there is little doubt, when we see him in his evening flight, of his having left recently a bed of very opposite description a bed, in short, of dung wherein, through the live-long day, he has been reposing; or whereat, like his Egyptian prototype, he has been hard at work, helping, perhaps, his partner to roll masses for enclosure of her eggs, or to bore holes for their reception. The drone of the dor-beetle was once taken as a prognostic of fine weather, and is esteemed by some people, although a harsh, yet by no means an " undelightful hum." To us, asso- ciate though it be with warm and quiet evenings, there is always a sort of sadness in its sound, perhaps because it reminds us of Gray's " Elegy," perhaps because, being most often heard towards autumn, it comes like a requiem of depart- ing summer. Allied to the above, as belonging to the useful company of insect scavengers, are the " Burying Beetles," 1 so called from their being accustomed to perform the office of grave-diggers to defunct frogs, birds, moles, " mice, and such small gear," whose bodies would else cumber the ground more extensively. A common species of this serviceable family of the Coleop- terous order is a pretty-looking insect, considerably smaller than the " great dor," and easily distinguishable from that and other black beetles by two broad scalloped bands of deep orange-colour painted across its black wing-cases, which are a good deal shorter than the body, and have the appearance of being truncated, or abruptly cut across the ends. The thorax, head, and legs are of a deep black, also the body; the 1 Necrophorus vespillo. See Vignette. THE BURYING BEETLE. 319 latter fringed at the sides and articulations with yellowish hairs ; the antennas knobbed and foliate at the tips. We must inquire now into the " burying beetle's " motive of incitement to its laborious occupation of interment. It is not certainly the promotion of our sanitary benefit that the creature has in view ; neither, we suppose, has respect for the dead or their families much to do with its burial of animal re- mains. The incentive to the work is not to be found in mere love of labour, nor yet in love of self, but is, in fact, like the mainspring of various other insect actions, of a parental charac- ter. Its eggs being first committed to the carcase, the beetle then proceeds to commit that to the earth, in order that, thus protected from predatory birds and foxes, it may afford provi- sion for her young, as soon as, in the shape of larvae, they come into existence. This most curious practice of instinctive saga- city was first noticed by a foreign naturalist, M. Gleditsch, who, having observed the mysterious disappearance of moles, laid upon the beds in his garden, discovered that beetles were the agents of their inhumation, effected for the purpose above named. To watch their proceedings more narrowly, he put four of these insect grave-diggers into a glass vessel, half filled with earth, on the surface of which were laid two dead frogs. Of these, one was interred in less than twelve hours the other on the third day. He then introduced a dead linnet, on which the beetles were speedily engaged. They began their operations by pushing out the earth from under the body, so as to form a cavity for its reception : and it was curious to see the efforts which they made, by dragging from below at the feathers of the bird, to pull it into its grave. The male, having driven the female away, continued to work alone for five hours. He lifted up the bird, changed its place, turned and arranged it in its grave, from time to time coming out of the hole, mounting on the carcase, treading it underfoot, and then again retiring below to draw it to a greater depth. At length, wearied appnrently with this incessant labour, he came forth. 320 THE CHURCH-YARD BEETLE. and laid his Lead upon the earth beside the bird, without the smallest motion, for a full hour, as if to rest ; then again crept under the earth. The next day, in the morning, the bird was an inch and a half below the surface of the ground, and the trench remaining open ; the corpse seemed as if laid out upon a bier, surrounded by a rampart of mould. In the evening it had sunk half an inch lower, and in another day the work was completed, and the bird covered. Other dead animals being added, the four beetles, in fifty days, interred no less than twelve bodies in the narrow cemetery allotted for their work. 1 Of a sepulchral character in unison with the above, but of associations much more gloomy as connected with ourselves, is the beetle of the churchyard, 2 our proposed pattern for a vane on the Exchange. This dark, ill-favoured, ill-scented, and, in the eye of super- stition, ill-omened insect whose proper name (Blaps mor- tisaga) savours of mortality as strongly as its common, though not popular appellation is one of those creeping things from which whenever, in its favourite haunt, it happens to cross our path, we turn instinctively away, even as we are wont with other, the like mementos, come they in what shape they may. The sepulchral locality in which the Slaps mortisaga is usually met with, may serve, of itself, to enable those unac- quainted with insects to give a pretty shrewd guess as to its character and occupation. It may also be distinguished as one of the blackest of all black beetles, its funeral sable being totally unrelieved by those tints of green, and blue, and violet, or even brown, which, in most others of its tribe, serve to enliven their prevailing sombre hue. In form, this haunter of cemeteries is rather long and slender, both the body and the wing-cases, by which it is quite covered, terminating in a 1 M. Gleditsch, quoted by Kirby and Spence ; also in " Insect Architecture." 2 Blaps Mortisaga. See Vignette. PILL-BEETLES. 321 tapered point. The antennae are jointed in their whole length, but are destitute at their extremities of foliated knobs. There is another set of little leaping beetles, called His- teridce also spring visitants whose exterior is really much more prepossessing than their resorts and practices would lead one to expect. Some of these present us with exceedingly pretty specimens of nature's sculpture ; and, from their habit of contracting the legs and antennae immediately upon being alarmed or touched, resemble, when thus indrawn, a carved seed (usually black, or black and red) rather than a carved insect. Hence derived are their familiar names of " Pill " and " Horse-bean beetles/' 1 Flies are usually the next agents of consumption, followed by a host of other beetles. 1 Histerida. ^ lii . mi umixosev of fifth fit niiftlVm at' iM timm ait- ut *rslnp. Entering at the open casement, appear the head and shoulders of a Death's- head Moth (Acherontia Atropos). The table below is occupied by two Death- watch Beetles (Anobium tessellatum and A. pertinax), while another (Anobium striatum) is creeping up the wall above. All three are drawn much larger than life. INSECT DIRGE-PLAYERS. T the open window of her solitary kitchen, half lighted by this October moon, half by a flaring candle, sits All-work Deborah at her tea- Why, suddenly arrested in its prophetic orbit, does the tea-cup, in the very turn of fortune, drop, shivered, from her shaking hand ? Why does her tal- lowy dip dip at once into darkness? What is the wailing cry that salutes her startled ear? Is it the voice of a screech- owl from the barn, or the squeal of a mouse from the cup- board ? No ! It is the shriek of some gloomy night-flier, which, entering at the casement, has put out the candle, A NIGHT VISITANT. 323 and deposits its dusky form upon the snow-white dresser. Deborah can only dimly discern it by the help of the rnoon. " Oh, for a light !" she inwardly ejaculates ; but evening is warm, the grate is cold, and the damsel dares not stir. At length, however, in some way or another the candle is relit. With trembling hand she places it on the dresser, to "show up" the characters of her alarming visitant, who ever and anon continues to salute her with its mournful wail. Deborah is a country girl, and has therefore learnt, of course, to distinguish betwixt a butterfly and a black beetle ; and she thought, till this awful moment, that she knew, quite as well, the difference between a brown moth and a spirit, black, white, or grey. That the thing upon her dresser is a moth, of size prodigious, the candle seems to tell her; but there, as it lies, vibrating its dingy pinions in unison with its dismal cry, somewhat else seems to tell her that it is no moth at all, or a moth of most strange unnatural behaviour, not at all to her liking. Whether to rid herself by fair means, or by foul, of her unwelcome guest, " that is the question." By alarming, to drive away, she might bring the creature in her very face, or on her very back ; better at once to " end it." So Deborah screws up her courage, seizes on a knife, approaches with a murderer's step her now quiescent victim, and with a dexterity under existing circumstances, perfectly miraculous, severs its head from its body. Then, as though a coffin had popped from out the grate, bounds Deborah from the dresser with a piercing scream. Most marvellous ! most horrible ! She hears a^ain, O * louder and more doleful than before, that melancholy cry, and it is the moth's bodiless head, or headless body, from whence it issues. She lifts the candle holds it nearer to the object, the now twofold object of her terror she looks she listens perhaps her ears, or eyes, or hand, had played her false ; but, no ! they and her murderous weapon had all been true : here lies the head, there the body, and, sure enough, too, the head still wails as if in suffering, and the body heaves, arid the dark 324 A MEMENTO MORI. wings quiver, as if in indignation. But it is not alone these quivering pinions which impart a motion like their own to Deborah's whitened lip. It is not even the wail of that dis- severed head which causes her heart to beat like a muffled drum, in accompaniment of its plaintive pipe ; but she sees she sees, plain as the effigy on Master Thomson's new tomb- stone right on the creature's back, between its shoulders, another head an eyeless skull magnified, by terror and consciousness of cruelty, into size above the human. Poor Deborah beholds no more she has seen and heard too much, and falls, plump as her person, on the kitchen floor. There her mistress, after having by reiterated peals broken the parlour bell, was the first to find her. In due time, this veracious tale of wonder was gathered from the domestic's lips ; and in the mutilated object of her alarm, was discovered the deca- pitated corpse of a Death's-head Moth. Next, in the power of raising superstitious terror, and as more common than the last, an agent of creating it more extensively, comes the "Death-watch," that pocket time-piece of the grisly monarch, heard, not seen, whose measured tick tick gives warning of its master's soundless footsteps. What hollow echoes are awakened by this monotonous midnight music ! Let us now inspect them in a calmer and clearer manner. First, for the Death's-head the Sphinx or Acherontia Atropos of the entomologist. And here, in the largest of British moths, we have a beautiful insect of richly variegated plumage, bird-like in magnitude the " wandering bird " of Poland. In the upper wings, which, when expanded, cover an extent of nearly five inches, the prevailing hues are very dark, but elegantly disposed in waves and shades of brown and black, broken by a few lighter clouds, and one small white spot near the centre. The secondary pinions, of less sombre colouring, are of a deep ochreous yellow, barred with black ; a livery in which the massive body is also attired. The head and thorax THE DEATH'S-HEAD MOTH. 325 are dark, and it is on the back of the latter that the insect bears its dreaded badge, the death's head, to which it owes its name, figured in yellowish grey upon a sable ground. The power possessed by the death's-head of emitting sound (a gift rarely, if at all in any other instance, bestowed upon its race) gives to this singular moth another fancifully imputed attribute of the supernatural ; and the character of its voice, if voice it may be called, loud, shrill, and wailing, invests it with an accordant tone of evil augury. However fanciful its prophecy of ill to others, the lament of this unusually com- plaining creature would seem to be a real expression of being ill at ease itself, since, according to Reaumur, when " shut up in a box, it cries ; when caught, it cries; and when held between the fingers, it never ceases crying." Naturalists have been sorely puzzled and widely at variance as to the organs producing this frequently-employed voice. One supposes it to proceed from the body ; another thinks it is produced by friction of the chest upon the abdomen, the wings having nothing to do therewith ; a third, tout au con- trairej supposes he has discovered the organs of sound in a pair of scales at the wing's base, played upon by the action of the pinions themselves. 1 Reaumur opined that the cry proceeded from the insect's head, its immediate source being the friction of the palpi against the tongue. Passerini, Dumeril, and Duponchel, have traced the origin of the sound to the interior of the insect's head ; from which, according to the statement of the latter, the sound continues to proceed on separation of the body. Yet later than all the above varied opinions, and only accor- dant with one, comes that of Mr. Denny, according to which, the true organs, producing the death's-head's melancholy strain, are two large moveable horny scales, at the bases of the upper wings, fixed on the thorax, and covering each a small aperture, which is also a horny substance. In proof that the vibration of 1 M. De Johet. 1 1 326 DEATH'S HEAD CATERPILLAR these scales causes the sound, it is stated that during its emis- sion they, only, are in a state of strong vibration, while all other parts of the insect may be at rest. September, or the present month of October, is the season, usually, when the Acherontia Atropos assumes its winged form, and may be found, occasionally, resting in daytime upon trunks of trees, or, attracted by the taper's light, visiting our houses, where their phantom forms are, now, much oftener welcomed for their rarity and real beauty than dreaded for once imputed terrors. Invested, through the mortal emblem on its tabard, with the imaginary office of herald to the Fates, disease and death were anticipated in the wake of its heavy pinions, or thought to be announced by its mournful cry. A whole sisterhood of nuns could be terrified by the apparition of a single death's-head within their holy precincts ; and a parish priest, desirous to work by terror on the consciences of his flock, could find for his purpose a powerful instrument in the appearance of this harmless insect, which, in the year 1730, was described by a cure of Bretagne, as " revetu de tout ce qu'une pompefunebre offre de plus triste." Even its wings appeared to his deluding or deluded fancy, to be, "marquetees commeune espece de drap mortuaire." The caterpillar of the death's-head moth is one of the largest and most beautiful of its tribe, and presents, in its bril- liant colouring, a striking contrast to the lugubrious colouring of its perfect form. It is of a fine yellow, obliquely barred by seven green stripes on each side, with intervening lines of blue and black spots. It has the pointed tail-like horn common to hawk-moths, and is endowed, moreover, as in its perfect state, with the gift (boasted, we believe, by no other caterpillar) of a voice ; for it is said by Kirby that if disturbed, it draws back rapidly and emits a loud noise, which may be compared to the crackle of an electric spark. Its favourite food is fur- nished by the leaves of the jasmine and potato ; and, with DEATH-WATCH BEETLES. 327 the increased cultivation of the latter, the death's head has become of late years less scarce than formerly. The caterpillar is said to feed also on hemp, elder, and the woody nightshade. It is mentioned in the " Cambridge Chro- nicle" of September 1846, that Mr. Demny took twenty of the full-grown larva? from off a tea-tree, growing on the top of a house at the back of Downing-terrace, all of which he successfully reared into splendid specimens of their kind. These caterpillars, as well as various others, are apt to elude the search of the collector by taking refuge during day-time from the sun's rays and the darts of ichneumon-flies, not merely under the leaves they feed on, but in the earth beneath them. To the same bed they retire towards the end of August or beginning of September, and, forming therein their smooth untapestried chambers, put off their gay attire for chrysalidan covers. From these, as we have seen, they burst in autumn, harbingers of wintry death, at least to the vegetable world. The ominous Death-watch, when drawn from its hiding- place in old perforated floor or wainscot, picture-frame, chest, or black-lettered volume, comes forth (a mouse from a moun- tain of fear !) a tiny beetle of some quarter of an inch in length, and in its prevailing hues of grey and brown resembling the colour of the time-worn wood, whose decay they help (especially in their grubhood) to accelerate. That alarming " tick," to which at midnight many a timorous heart has beat in unison, is generally to be heard first in May, and on to autumn, by day as well as night, and, being considered analo- gous in purpose to the " call " of pairing birds, has, in reality, as little of ominous about it. The sound is not vocal, but consists of a series of quick successive beats, produced, usually, by the striking of the insect's mailed head upon the hard substance whereon it may be standing, or into which it has penetrated, most likely, while a grub. Some have supposed the grub itself to be the drummer, but, if this sometimes be the case, the perfect beetle is a drummer too, various accurate 328 DESTRUCTIVE WOOD-BORERS. observers having been eye as well as ear witnesses of its performance. There are various species of these ticking, or more properly beating, beeetles, of the genus Anobium, of which a marked characteristic is the concealment, nearly, of the head beneath the thorax. Amongst these, two noted drummers are distin- guishable by their uniforms in other words, by the markings of their wing-cases, which in one 1 are striated, in the other 2 tessellated. Another of a plain dark brown (Anobium perti- nax\ frequent in holes of old wood, has long been famous for its pertinacity in simulating death, and for displaying a seeming indifference to torture, comparable only to the American Indian. De Geer affirms, upon experiments which it needs not to repeat, that " you may maim, pull limb from limb, or roast over a slow fire this pertinacious creature, and not a joint will move in token that it suffers. A curious instance, this, of the unconquerable power of an instinct implanted for self- preservation." However insignificant in their imputed attributes, these wood-boring beetles are by no means despicable in their actual proceedings. Where abundant, not only chairs, tables, and books have been reduced to powder, but even buildings have suffered from their combined agency. Curtis mentions the roof of King's College, Cambridge, having been seriously damaged by their operations, and thinks that the same species (the Anobium tesselatum) has been known to cut through sheet-lead. Such is the living main-spring of the death-watch when taken from out its wooden case; and though all its terrors vanish on being brought to light, it is easy enough to account for their origin in connection with place, time, and cir- cumstance. Most heard in old (perhaps haunted) houses, proceeding from wainscot or from bed's head, perhaps from picture-frame 1 Anobium striatum. ' 2 Anvbium tesselutum. SCIENCE VERSUS SUPERSTITION. 329 of grim old portrait, as if the " tick, tick," of the invisible time-piece issued verily from the lace-fobbed pocket of some buried ancestor; or heard, possibly, with creeping awe, to proceed, " tick, tick, tick," from the elm- wood of a coffin before consigned with its mute tenant to the earth ; heard, too, by night-wakers, the sick and the solitary, or night- watchers keeping their vigil beside the dying or the dead, who can wonder that, with such concomitants, the hearts of the ignorant should have often, and may sometimes still echo, fearfully, the beat of the death-watch ? And, perhaps, with all our little knowledge, our own might, under the like circumstances, do the same. Thus much for the wailing pipe and monotonous tabors of our " Insect Dirge-Players." The insects chosen for this Vignette are such as afford examples either of longevity, of brevity of existence, or of great disproportions in the length of its several stages. The Brown Weevil (Curculio), a feeder on decayed wood, at the right hand corner, gives an instance of longevity, contrasted by the brief duration of the Ephemeral Day -fly (Baetii), which rises upwards on the left. In this Ephemera there are two instead of (as in E. vufgata) three fila- ments, proceeding from the extremity of the body. On the right, is a common Cockchafer (Melolontha vulgaris); another of the same species, just arrived at maturity, is pushing upwards from the grass ; while.a third, yet in its stage of larva, is exhibited in the ground beneath. In this, its form of imperfection, it exists within the earth for several years, living in the air as a perfect insect for perhaps a fortnight. On the oak-leaf to the left are two leaf-galls, one exhibiting its enclosed grub a long liver, as compared with the little Gall-fly (Cynips Quercus folii), which is seen in upward flight above. SHORT LIVES AND LONG. UR chosen emblems of fragility are flowers ; and, fixed by the laws of their creation to one spot, where they bud, and bloom, and wither beneath our eye, we have been compelled, almost, to notice their brevity, and are sensible^ at times, of the moral odour which exhales from the union of their beauty and fragility. INSECTS FRAGILE AS FLO WEES. 331 In the world of insects, examples of existence, bright and brief and most precarious, are no less common, and in many respects (especially as occurring amongst sensitive beings) in- finitely more striking; but, except with those sporters of a day, hence called Ephemera, the frail tenures of insect life seldom serve to remind us of the like nature of our own, and chiefly, perhaps, for the following reason. Many a brilliant flutterer is cut off in the midst of its joyous activity, much more suddenly than the flower over which we have seen it hover, but ere the scattered petals of the one have strewed the surface of the ground, the wings of the other have borne it to die unseen within some hidden covert; or, contributing in death to the support of life, it may have sunk suddenly into the devouring gulf of some insectivorous bird, or carnivorous feeder of its own race. It is, by the way, a remarkable dispensation of Nature's Author, and one equally beautiful and kind, that while Death is for ever busy, as elsewhere, in the lower departments of the animal kingdom, so few of the victims they afford him are permitted to offend the eye in any shapes of disgust or danger. To confine this observation merely to insects : We see the air teeming with gnats ; the ground populous with ants and beetles ; the fields, especially towards the end of summer, alive with grasshoppers and Tipulidan flies ; the hedges, through the months of June and July, scarcely more abundant in leaves than in the smaller moths, which in daytime make a covert of their foliage : and of these countless myriads we are told, truly, that even of those among them permitted to reach their good old age, scarce a single gnat survives a week ; not half the beetles, nor any of the Tipula, nor grasshoppers, a month ; while few are the butterflies or moths which over-live a fort- night. What has become of them ? may naturally be queried by those who bestow upon the subject a mere passing thought ; and though with those who have learnt something of insect history the marvel is greatly diminished, it still remains 332 DURATION OF INSECT LIFE. matter of some surprise, that of the myriads which die daily round and about our paths, so few "mortal remains" should meet our eye. Something, in short, of the same sort of mystery is attached to their entire disappearance as that which seems to have been noticed by some of old Fuller's " worthies," with regard to the disappearance of pins, which caused them to admire "that so many millions of these useful and neat little articles made, sold, used, and lost in England, should vanish away invisible ; " to the which remark, our excellent divine, with gravity becoming his profession, and quaintness belonging to his style and character, appends this serious reflection : that such persons may rather wonder how so many that wear them, being no more than pins in the hand of their Maker, do decay, die, and slip down in the dust in silence and obscurity. The duration of insect life varies greatly ; but there is one remark respecting it of very general application : Its last and most perfect stage is usually the most brief, often immensely disproportioned to those which have preceded it. A few instances do, indeed, occur, of insects being very long-lived after their attainment of a perfect form ; but these are, for the most part, to be found, not among the gay and gaudy flutterers of air not among the livers upon sweets ambrosial quaffed from painted flower-cups, not more fragile than themselves not among the baskers in the sun, or the sporters on his beams; but rather amongst the dull, lugu- brious, sober-suited crawlers which lurk in the dark places of the earth and the dark corners of our habitations. An individual spider may often, it is probable, live long enough to lie in murderous wait for flying innocents, even to the fourth and fifth generation. Goldsmith, indeed, mentions one as having lived three years ; and though his authority on this, as well as on other matters, especially of natural history, has been often called in question, Audibert is also stated to have kept another quite as long. LONGEST LIVERS LEAST LIVELY. 333 Some of the weevils a tribe of beetles distinguished by their long beaks, or rostrums can also boast themselves of a span of life comparatively long. One of these, found upon rotten wood, the substance which it feeds on, we have kept under a glass from June to the April following, when it escaped. This, also, though it has not once grown torpid, may be considered as an insect of gloomy and retired habits, and, like others of its family which live in wood or earth, is of sombre dark-brown hue; 1 in this respect, strikingly con- trasted with the gayer colouring usually a vivid green, some- times red displayed by that more cheerful division of the same tribe, which is used to frequent and feed on trees and plants, in open daylight, and which die, probably, with the leaves and stalks whose sap constitutes their wine of life. It would seem, then, that the highest apparent degrees of vitality, sensitiveness, and enjoyment, are seldom, in insect life, made to consist with long duration. With them, to live long is not always to live much, though we may justly say of them, as of other and higher existences, that to live much is to live long. The Ephemera? for instance, in their single day of light and love as tenants of the air may be said to live longer than in the darksome years of their immurement within earth and water; while the butterfly, fluttering over the flowers of the grave, may enjoy more of existence in that short half-hour of sport and sunshine, than the churchyard beetle in the whole course of its buried career amongst the relics of mortality. In this seemingly disproportioned, yet in reality well-balanced allotment of insect life, there exists, as we have noticed, no parallel with the history of the soul, viewed as an immortal principle ; but amongst the instances just adduced, as well as a thousand more, there is not wanting a very marked corres- pondence with the earthly tenures of human existence as most usually holden. 1 See Vignette. 334 BALANCE OF VITALITY. Which are the lamps of clay found, commonly, to be the soonest broken, and most early committed to their congenial soil ? Common observation answers, Those, certainly, in which a brilliant flame has served to exhaust most speedily the animal oil whereon it fed. George Herbert said of himself, that he had "a wit, like a penknife in too narrow a sheath, too sharp for his body ;" and the remark is of general application. In the case of our old poet and divine, the " sheath," indeed, proved of tougher material than he seemed to anticipate, for long afterwards, writing about spring flowers (those favourite emblems of fragility) he says beautifully and devoutly '* And now in age I bud again, After so many deaths I live and write ; I once more smell the dew and rain, And relish versing. Oh, my only Light ! It cannot be that I am he On whom thy tempests fell all night. " These are thy wonders, Lord of love ! To make us see we are but flowers that glide, Which, when we once can find and prove, Thou hast a garden for us where to bide." Opposed to those who, whether their span of life may have been short or protracted, have lived, like the active May-fly, all through their day, there are multitudes over whose remains the well-known epitaph or epigram (from Camden) which heads our observations might seem appropriately placed. "Here lies the man was born, and cried, Lived sixty years fell sick, and died." Yet is even this, on our present principle of reckoning, a me- morial by far too eulogistic. " Lived sixty years ! " Why this crawling creature, who ate and slept away existence, did not live sixty years, nor a sixtieth part of them. Only com- pare the weary grub-like stage of such a creeping dullard, with the winged career of a Chatterton, a Kirke White, a Shelley, a Keats, and other brilliant Ephemera of a poetic sky, EXPERIMENTS ON INSECT LIFE. 335 and say if life be computed by the amount of actual living, by state, which, to mind, often annihilates and stands in the place of time, by spiritual measurement instead of by finger calcula- tion whether the balance of longevity, in its proper sense, may not incline rather to the span of twenty than of sixty years. Many curious experiments have*been tried successfully in the prolongation and curtailment of insect life. In some cases, starvation, that agent, usually, of destruction, has been found, by retarding the completion of its accustomed stages, to lengthen the journey of existence to our little fellow-travellers. The larva of an aphidivorous fly, placed by Kirby under a glass, where it was left inadvertently without food, was found alive three months afterwards, living eight times as long as it would have done in the combined periods of its usual unin- terrupted stages. Cold was also an agent employed by the French naturalist Reaumur to retard the emergence of butterflies from their aurelian cases, and thus prolong the duration of their life if we may apply the term to a state of apparent torpor. The chrysalis of a nettle butterfly, which usually emerges in a fortnight, being placed, with others, in a cellar, remained two months before exclusion. On the other hand, by the agency of heat, the naturalist who, through the exercise of this curious power over life and death, would seem, in a measure, to command nature can abbreviate instead of prolonging the term of existence. En- closing his chrysalides in the interior of a glass egg, Reaumur called in the assistance of a brooding hen to hatch the butter- flies he willed into a prematurity of perfect form, some of which appeared, accordingly, in four, instead of fourteen, days. From experimental facts and philosophical deduction, the lively French naturalist wanders into imaginative speculation on the probable results of some such life-influencing power in its application to the human race. First, in the case of abbre- viation : " A child," he remarks, " would have little reason to. K K 336 SPECULATIVE FANCIES. complain of a father who might be enabled to force him, in a few weeks, into a maturity of endowment, bodily and mental." He says, " Qui nous oterait nos premieres annees, qui les ferait passer en quelques jours, nous oterait peu. Qu'est ce que c*est que de vivre alors ? " So much for the curtailment, at its commencement, of life's unfolding roll ; and the power of its voluntary extension would, we fancy, prove a privilege scarcely more desirable. To put a case parallel with the artificial lengthening of insect life, we must, of course, suppose the extra period to be passed in a state of torpor. On these terms, the addition even of centuries to our three-score years and ten may appear only a nominal gain, since, as our French naturalist justly observes, " It is only the conscious train of thought and feeling which constitutes our real existence.*' To some people, however, he adds, it might appear exceedingly agreeable to live, even on the condition of torpid intervals, for ten or twelve ages, having in each a few years of active life. What changes in the face of nature, art, science, manners, tastes, and fashions would such persons behold ; and how, in all these matters, would each succeeding period enlarge upon the tale of wonder told by its predecessor ! Only imagine a courtier, a lord in waiting on King George the Third or his consort Charlotte, awakened from a nap of only fifty years, to fill the like office in the court of our Sovereign Lady. Verily, upon opening his eyes on the strange things around, they would be stretched beyond power of re- closing. Suppose him called on to attend the Queen in one of her frequent " progresses ; " well might such a sleeper awakened rub those distended eyes, and doubt his wakefulness, on beholding his royal mistress step into what appears to his bewildered sight some palace of enchantment, wherein she, and he, her astonished satellite, are forthwith whirled along ; by what ? surely, he believes, by some obedient slave, invisible, of lamp or ring; for how can he have dreamt, in his dreamless SPECULATIVE FANCIES. 337 slumber, of the slave of the kettle that giant genius, Steam, which had arisen, while he slept, at the bidding of the n:agician, Science, to make a button, to compound a pill, and to transport a sovereign? Or suppose an individual of the present day, thrown by mesmeric or ethereal influence into a deep, dead, bond fide slumber, for the remaining half of this nineteenth century, who shall venture to imagine the astounding marvels on which his eyes would open at the beginning of the twentieth ? Marvels, vastly curious and amusing in the speculative distance, but of which the close reality might be attended by various sensations something less agreeable. The old-fashioned courtier would feel awkward enough in the position we have just supposed amongst his modern brethren of the suite ; but how infinitely more so one of these latter under circumstances wherein the lapse of another half-century might place him, when called on, perhaps, to attend his sovereign if sovereigns there be, or if sovereigns then have lords in waiting in a state balloon ! I \Mie Hiveaiu- itt' Jhisect Viti- arc mxvunis In On the right, creeping down the bank, is a common Glowworm, the wingless female of a beetle (Lampyris noctiluca) which is seen descending from the corner opposite. Beneath, crawls a luminous or electric Centipede (Scolopendra ehctrica) ; and near, in the centre of the foreground, is one of our native Click Beetles (Elateridai), not (as represented by mistake) a luminous insect, but closely allied to, and much resembling, the Fire-fly (Elater noctilucus) of the West Indies and South America. STARS OF THE EARTH. HE attention of philosophers was in very early ages directed to various phenomena resulting from the properties of light, and, amongst others, the remarkable phosphoric appearances of certain animal and vegetable bodies. Ancient writers allude in general terms to the existence of luminous insects, of which the species most early known is supposed to be the Linria?an Lampyrides, or flying glowworms, TROPIC FIRE-FLIES. 339 abundant in the south of Europe, as well as in Asia and some parts of Africa. The Greeks included all shining insects under the name Lampyris, and the Latins called them Cicindela, Noctiluca, and Lucciola, under which latter designation the flying glowworms are still known in Italy. With the Fulyorce, or lantern-flies, the ancients are thought to have had no acquaintance, for, though Asia produces a few species of them, the most remarkable are peculiar to the warmest parts of America. The great lantern-flies spoken of above belong to that order of insects termed Hemiptera, being allied, unlike as they may seem, to bugs, boat-flies, and water-scorpions ; but the fire-fly of the tropics, being of the order Coleoptera, is a beetle. By day, as sombre and dull-looking a little animal as any to be seen ; shape, longish ; colour, blackish brown. When at rest, or walking, it is content with the display of only two lights, emitted from a pair of lamps, or yellow tubercles, placed on either side the chest ; but when, with wings extended, it shoots across the dusky sky, another luminary, also in the thorax, but seated further back, is rendered visible. Though we have none of these fire-flies, as yet, in England, we have certain insects of the same family, which in all, save luminosity, greatly resemble them. These are the very common longish brown beetles, known familiarly as " spring and click beetles," also " skip-jacks " names expressive of their power, when laid upon their backs, of springing or leaping into the air, with a clicking sound. Our readers, as we hope, all know by this time, that every beetle has been in its time a grub or larva. They have all heard, too, most likely, of that farmer's terror, the destructive wire-worm ; but to some, even amongst farmers, it may possibly be a piece of information that this wire-worm is none other than the beetle grub, and the grub, moreover, of such a beetle as the click, or skip-jack, an Elater, 1 nearly resembling the tropic 1 See Vignette. 340 FLYING GLOWWORMS. fire-fly ; the grub of the latter loving to feed on the roots of sugar-canes (to which, says Humboldt, it is often very injurious), in lieu of the roots of corn and other vegetables, the favourite fare of his British relative. Like the tropic fire-flies, these glowworms are beetles, though of a different family, that of the Lampyridce, of which the Lucciola is a very small species, with blackish-brown wing- cases; the legs, as well as thorax, of which the shield nearly hides the head, being reddish yellow. The light of these insects, when creeping, or perching upon trees, is described as being hardly perceptible, but "becoming brilliant on flight; not constant, but scintillating, as if disclosed on successive ex- pansions of the wings. Appearing with the twilight, their full radiance shines forth in darkness ; when some, shooting through the air, make luminous tracks in all directions, while others spangle the shrubs and herbage. 1 Their appearance and effect in the neighbourhood of Genoa has been thus described by Sir J. E. Smith :~ " On the eve of St. John the Baptist, the great festival of Genoa, the town was brilliantly illuminated, while along the purple coast to the west, the last rays of the setting sun still trembled on the hills, and the moon arose in the east. To these three contrasted lights was added the singular effect of innumer- able flying glowworms darting their momentary splendour through all the streets, gardens, and rooms. We used frequently to catch these little insects, and entangle them in the ladies' hair and head-dresses, a decoration which the women of some countries adopt for themselves." Our English glowworm 3 (as we presume most people are aware) is the wingless female of a winged beetle, which also carries a light, though one of much inferior lustre.* 1 See " Naturalist's Library." 3 In " Sketch of a Tour on the Continent," quoted in " Nat. Lib." 3 Lampyris noctiluca. See Vignette. 4 A solitary glowworm, resembling the English, but much larger and more brilliant, was seen by Bishop Heber in Ceylon. He makes no mention or' lantern-fiies. THE GLOWWORM'S TAPER. 341 Cui bono, the lady's taper ? To answer this inquiry Con- jecture has been clever, but, as usual, often at variance with herself. While it is supposed by some that the light of the wingless beetle is bestowed for her protection, to scare away her hungry foes, the nightingale and other birds of night ; it is opined by others, that the insect's gift of brilliancy (like many of the like sort bestowed upon mankind) is the very mean of her destruction, the very lure and light by which her biped foes are assisted to discover and devour her. Some people, again, have suggested that, whatsoever else its purpose, the glowworm's luminary may be employed as a lamp for her own supper- table, after having previously lent its aid in the finding of her evening meal. It has been observed, indeed, that, for the serving of both such uses, her light would have seemed placed more conveniently at head than tail j but its diffusion, we should think, is amply wide enough to render this objection of little import. The LampyridfBj even of our northern climate, have southern predilections, being never seen in the north of Scot- land, and most universally abounding in the southern English counties. To most of the dwellers in these her favourite resorts, the person of our insect lamp-bearer, so -conspicuously displayed in her own light, must have been, we should suppose, familiar (as with ourselves) from the summer nights of childhood, from that night, in particular, never to be forgot, which first brought one of these shining mysteries within the compass of our fingers and a box. While of other little creepers we yet scarce knew the difference betwixt head and tail, the figure of our first captive glowworm, as seen at night, and examined next morning, almost before daylight served, was stamped upon our memory ; and, had we never seen another since, we should not forget her tiny head, and, as we called them, horns, mocking our curious eye, as she just put forth and then with- 342 NATURE OF INSECT LIGHTS. drew them under the shielding back-plate which covered the fore-part of her body ; that slate-coloured, oblong, flat, wingless body, all divided into rings, and bearing at its nether extremity the lamp, by night a lustrous emerald, by day a dull pale spot, composed, as we have learnt now, of the sulphur-coloured substance which supplies its light. 1 Of this article, by the way, though it cost her nothing, the glowworm, it would seem, is somewhat economic; Gilbert White, at least, confirmatory of Will Shakespeare, having thought that she always puts out her light at the decent hour of eleven or twelve, or begins then, according to the poet and the poetic idea, to " pale her ineffectual fire." Now for a word or two, borrowed, of course, from the scientific page, but considerably at variance, respecting the supposed nature and quality of this and other insect fires. One experimentalist, 2 having found that the glowworm's light is neither diminished by immersion in water, nor increased by application of heat, that it is not capable of ignition by the flame of a candle, nor possessed of any sensible heat when separate from the bearer's body, denies in this luminous matter the existence of any ordinary composition of phosphorus ; suggesting, however, that the above facts are favourable to the supposition of light being a quality of matter, rather than a substance. Another examiner, 3 on the contrary, seems to have ascer- tained that the glowworm's light-diffusing substance is chiefly albumen, combined with a portion of phosphorus; and as phosphorus can only become luminous by contact with oxygen (supposing it uncombined with a fatty matter or albumen), he considers this requisite supplied by means of the male insect's respiration, which is strongest during flight; while, in the female, which flies not at all, the greater quantity of albuminous 1 See Vignette. 2 Mr. Macartney, quoted by Kirby and Spence. 3 Mr. Macaire, quoted in " Naturalist's Library." POETRY OF INSECT LIGHTS. 343 substance contained in her thick body more than compensates for the lesser respiratory action. Enough, at all events, has been ascertained about the illu- minating matter of the glowworm's lamp to prove it perfectly incapable of setting light to any tapers, save those of fairy manufacture. Who could quarrel with that pretty conceit of our immortal Bard, which converts, " the glowworm's fiery eyes " into lucifers, for the use of Titania's household ? Yet, in our character of entomologist, we may, perhaps, be per- mitted to observe, that Shakespeare has here taken more of poet's licence than he is wont to do in his allusions to natural objects, which are in general so infinitely more correct than those of his modern brethren of the lyre. It is admissible enough to term " fiery" what looks luminous, but it is a long stretch, truly, even to the length of the creature's an- tipodes, to endow it with " fiery eyes," in lieu of a fiery- seeming tail. Before having quite done with " fiery eyes," we may notice that if the " Swan of Avon" had applied this epithet to the moth instead of glowworm, his fancy would have better cor- responded with fact; for a fact it is, though probably quite unknown in the days of Shakespeare, that many species of night-flying moths are endowed with luminosity in the organs of sight, the light being most visible while the insect is in motion. " Pour 1'amour de ses beaux yeux," we may perhaps, there- fore, include the moth among luminous insects; but there is another, a native of England, perhaps as common as the glow- worm, which, although from its habits comparatively little noticed, shares her luminous endowments to a very considerable extent. This is the electric centipede, 1 a black, many-legged crawler, which almost everybody must have seen and shrunk from, as it has crossed their path in the day-time. As this 1 Scolopendra electrica. See Vignette. 344 USES OF INSECT LIFE. creature (which has been likened to a miniature model of a serpent's skeleton) moves, serpent-like, forward or backward, he leaves behind him, or before him, a tangible track of the phosphoric light, which, in darkness, strongly illuminates his unsightly form ; but, as if conscious of his loathly aspect, it is mostly in daylight, when it is least conspicuous, that he issues from his lair, some abode of darkness, either in the earth, or beneath a stone. The Mole Cricket is another insect which has been supposed to emit light ; to have been, indeed, in some cases, the veritable Jack o'Lantern the ignis fatuus of the benighted traveller. The harmless quality of all these insect lights is a kind provision of Nature, no less adapted than a variety of others to attract our admiring notice. Truly, it is a thing wonderful and beautiful, to find in animated forms a substance so nearly resembling that formidable element, fire ; one possessed of its power to diffuse light, yet wholly destitute of its dangerous properties. Have luminous insects the quality of use ? In common with all created things undoubtedly they have, and to themselves their luminaries serve clearly some important purpose, however we may yet be in the dark as to their exact mode of appliance. Nor, as regards mankind, are these " diamonds of the night " altogether without their value, having, as such, been made in several countries subservient both to ornament and use. While our native glowworms have begemmed no other beauty but that of the sleeping wild-flowers, the tropic fire-flies have sparkled in dark tresses, and been rivalled by flashing eyes, have been employed by the gay in the decoration of festive garments, and by the grave in the conning of small print. The Pere du Tertre, in his history of the Antilles, speaks of reading his Breviary by the light of one of these living lamps. The natives of St. Domingo, and other islands, are also said to have used them literally as " a light to their LIGHTS TO DEVOTION. 345 feet and a lantern to their paths," by attaching one to each foot when travelling by night, employing them also in the lighting of their habitations. Fire-flies serve, besides, the important purpose of destroying mosquitos, which are their favourite prey. But the glimmer of our English glowworm ? that surely can serve no other uses save its own ? She would be a dull diamond in the maiden's tresses a dim light to read by a sorry lantern on a murky night. True; but for all that, she shines not for herself alone : for us, also, her light is not without its uses. What these are we may best answer when returning from our summer's evening walk, as the glowworms and the stars are coming out together ; for then our minds must be more creeping than the wingless light-bearers themselves, if they rise not from them to the glorious orbs they humbly imitate, and thence to the Great Source and Centre of Life and Lifjht, from whom alike emanate the " stars of the earth " and the suns of the universe. we fire tr$o irf tlw t!K0w wornt^ /( The examples of slow and swift-footed beetles here given, are the Oil- Beetle (Meloe vulgaris), laboriously creeping up, and the Tiger-Beetle (Cicindela campestris), rapidly descending the sandy bank. Below, is a fast walker, almost runner, among hairy caterpillars, and above, on a lime-tree twig, sits the stately larva of the Lime Hawk Moth (Smerinthus Tilice), like the rest of its Sphinx-like brethren, slow-footed and averse to motion. The two flies are of a flower-resorting species, called vibrating (Scioptera vibrans), which are distinguished by 'red heads, scarlet eyes, black-tipped wings, and that qui- vering or vibrating motion to which they owe their name. INSECT MOVEMENTS. ,N their endless variety of movement, the Insect races resemble, equal, and in many cases sur- pass, nearly every other animated tribe of earth, air, and water. They walk with the quadruped ; fly with the bird ; crawl with the reptile ; swim with the fish ; do all, in short, but march erect, WALKING INSECTS. 347 like the man and the monkey; while many of them are endowed with motive powers of a kind possessed by no other living creatures with which we are acquainted. But the best way, perhaps, to obtain a tolerable notion of the extent and perfection of insect activities will be to divide them into two classes, the one consisting of movements common to other animals, the other of those nearly or quite peculiar to themselves. First, for that most ordinary mode of progression, walking. This, among insects, (most of which are possessed, in their perfect state, of six legs) varies in rate or pace from the slowest creep to the swiftest run. The Coleopterdj or Beetle-tribe, alone furnish instances of each degree of progression exem- plified in its extremes by the laborious creep of the oil-beetle, 1 overwhelmed, seemingly, by oozing fatness, and the light, rapid, agile course of the predatory Carabus, 1 or that of the rapacious Cicindela, resembling " The forest's leaping panther, Fierce, beautiful, and fleet." Some butterflies amongst others, the little " Tortoise-shell" may be designated insect quadrupeds, inasmuch as of their six legs the two foremost being very short and imperfect, four only serve the purpose of walking ; an accomplishment, by the way, in which butterflies in general, like the ladies of England, do not particularly excel. If rapidity of pace depended on the number of instruments employed in walking, both butterfly and moth, in their estate of caterpillars, would always outstrip, as pedestrians, their own winged maturity, sixteen, instead of six or four, being the number of legs with which caterpillars are usually provided. This, however, is only the case in cer- tain instances, for hardly do beetles exhibit greater variety in their rates of movement than the larvae of Lepidoptera. We 1 See Vignette. L L 348 CATERPILLARS SWIFT AND SLOW. speak, indeed, of all caterpillars as " crawlers;" but while some " drag their slow length along," tardy as the tortoise, or that " Enfant la terre errant sur le gazon, Prive d'os et de sang, et portant sa maison," others run with the rapidity of " the Hare," an appellative really bestowed for its swiftness, on a foreign species. There are not wanting English runners of the same description. We may notice, amongst them, as a very common specimen, a caterpillar (that, we believe, of the Large Ermine Moth) with a skin blackish or greenish, striated in its length by a broad white line on either side, and thickly covered by a coat of long brown fur, made up of tufts proceeding from studs or tubercles. 1 This, one of the pillagers of promiscuous cates of an herbaceous description, may frequently be seen by roadside or in garden, and usually in company of several messmates, employing his jaws with prodigious celerity on the leaves of dock, plantain, dandelion, marigold, or violet. If we rudely interrupt him in his harmless feasting, he rolls up instanter, and falls from his station a defensive feint of death or inactivity, from which, presently, he betakes himself to flight, and runs, or more pro- perly glides, away with a degree of celerity which leaves no doubt of the excellent use he can make, on occasion, of his eight pair of heels. As one of the foremost hindmost, rather of the creeping caterpillars, has been noticed that of the Hawk-moth, Filipen- dula, and the majority of its Sphinx-like brethren, 1 are slow footed as well as averse to movement. Flies, wasps, and ichneumons, may be all considered run- ners ; but, in accordance with that system of compensation so generally carried out amongst created things, it is chiefly amongst insects that are destitute of wings (those comprised in the Linnaean order Aptera) that we meet with such as are most agile and dexterous in the use of their legs, which vary in number from eight to above a hundred. 1 See Vignette. FLIGHT AGAINST WIND. 349 Besides the above, which are seldom abroad except at evening or at early morn, there are to be seen throughout the summer and the livelong summer's day, hovering over flower- borders or flowery hedges, a scattered company of two-winged flies, which, as somewhat resembling, may be taken on a cur- sory view for ^wr-winged bees. These are the Syrphi, whose prowess, while in their grub estate, as clearers of aphis- covered leaves those especially of the rose-tree we have celebrated in another place. 1 Contributing thus, through the carnivorous appetite of their growing youth, to the health and preservation of the plant, these aphidivorous flies, in their active and elegant maturity, heighten the beauty of the flower by adding to the number of its prettiest frequenters, as they now hover over the enamelled beds in suspension, seeming motionless, but maintained, in reality, by fast vibration of their pinions then dart with rapidity to some other wing-poisedstation. Few, perhaps, to look at the great burly body of a humble- bee when he is " tippling freely in a flower," would suspect him of out-cutting, when on wing, all the other high-fliers, and swift-fliers, and far-fliers of his order (Hymenoptera), in- cluding, as it does, all other bees, wasps, ichneumons, and saw- flies. Yet such is his reputation in the field (of air), or in the sporting calendar of the naturalist ; and while it outstrips its kind, the humble-bee (by no means humble in this particular) far exceeds, says Kirby, in proportion to its size, the flight of any bird. It is said by a German naturalist, 2 in speaking of the emi- grations of the feathered race, that birds require a wind which blows against them, such a contrary current helping to raise, and assist their flight. We are not aware, indeed, of any insect known to require this seemingly hindering help; but, however little one might think it, the comparatively fragile wings even of insects are often arrayed in battle against an opposing current. 1 See article on Aphides, and Vignette. M Brehm. 350 FLIGHT OF BUTTERFLIES. Not only can bees and some beetles pursue their flight in the wind's eye, but even butterflies have been seen, with their " sail-broad vans," making way against it. In power, swift- ness, and grace of motion, " the painted populace" present, in different families, something of the variety which adorns their pinions j but when we look at these summer vagrants, idly flitting " From bed to bed, from one to t'other border," we should hardly expect them ever to exemplify permanence as well as power of flight. We hear, however, not only of migrating birds, but also of migrating butterflies, of which some, not satisfied " The woods, the rivers, and the meadows green, With their air-cutting wings to measure wide," attempt, occasionally, to " measure ocean." For this purpose they sometimes assemble in gaily-bannered companies, and, in a straightforward continued course, press seaward and over sea, only, probably, to add in most cases to the number of those fair and fragile things which, strewed upon its surface, are for ever serving to augment the perishable " treasures of the deep." But we need not follow insects over ocean, or even stir from off our chair, to see the surpassing power of their organs of flight ; or, if we do not now see, we may remember, that the fly, now crawling so feebly up our window, was able, in the sunny heyday of her vigour, to sport above our heads at the rate of above thirty feet in a second, or more than the third of a mile in a minute the third of the distance which a race-horse can achieve in the same period. When, from the air, we glance downwards to the waters, we find the finny tribes in like manner equalled, and, size con- sidered, exceeded in their motive powers by a variety of insect swimmers. Those which, in their perfect state, are wont to inhabit or frequently resort to ponds and ditches such, for INSECT LEAPERS. 351 instance, as aquatic beetles are usually provided with a pair of hinder legs, long, strong, rather flattened, and densely fringed with hair, assisted by which they cut the fluid element in all directions, darting about, rising to the surface, or diving to the bottom with the utmost rapidity. The above are among the principal of those insect move- ments which resemble the common motions, on land, in air, and in water, of other animals ; but the latter exhibit some of a more peculiar character, wherewith insects also are endowed, besides others which would seem common to no other creatures but themselves. The serpent, deriving a false consequence from its very sen- tence of degradation, is said to have partly owed its deification to the power, once looked on as miraculous, of crawling with- out legs. This attribute of once mysterious motion is shared by many insects, which in their state of larva are legless, but can glide onwards, and sometimes with rapidity, not pushed along like the serpent by the points of the ribs, but by alternate contraction and extension of the rings of the body. The wonderful leaps of the salmon up cataracts (which these alone enable it to ascend), if, as has been stated, per- formed with tail in mouth, are imitated in manner as well as magnitude by an insect leaper, of which, as of the salmon, it may be descriptively affirmed that it is " at once both bow and arrow." This little animal, which is the legless larva of a minute and pretty fly, and not, as is popularly supposed, a mere offspring of decay, is none other than the cheese-hopper, a very curious and admirably constructed creature, though to none, save to entomologists and certain epicures, an object of admiration. Swammerdam saw one of these legless leapers spring out of a box six inches deep, or twenty-four times the length of its own body. To compass leaps like this and others more stupendous, the saltatory performer erects itself on its tail, which is furnished with two projections that enable it to maintain its balance. It then bends itself into a circle, catches 352 INSECT- CLIMBERS. a part near the tail with its hooked jaws, and, after strongly contracting itself from a circle into an oval, throws itself with a jerk into a straight line ; an action which effects the leap. There is a certain fish, 1 which, when tired of swimming in its native element, is said to take the air by ascending trees. This climbing fish must be looked on, we should think, as a very odd fish among his finny fellows, on account of the strangeness of such proceeding ; but the oddest part of it, to us, must appear, while unexplained, the power of the legless swimmer to accomplish his restless or ambitious purpose. This is effected, it would seem, by help of his spiny fins and gill- covers. Now a climbing chrysalis, as all must be ready to admit who know a chrysalis by sight, is a thing scarcely less wondrous seeming than a climbing fish ; and we find, in some instances, that the apparatus by which a chrysalis is assisted to climb, or raise itself upwards towards the surface, or from out the ground or other imbedding substance, is of a somewhat similar descrip- tion to the spines of the above-mentioned tenant of the waters. To give an instance. The Goat-moth, whose works, as a carpenter caterpillar, in heart of oak or willow we have elsewhere noticed, has a chry- salis which, as well as some others, is furnished with a row of spiny serratures, extending nearly round each ring of its body. The use of these appendages become sufficiently apparent when opportunity offers (as it has done with ourselves) of watching the emergement of this case-bound creature from out the strong cell of cemented woody particles in which it is usually enclosed. A hard head, armed with points, having first enabled it to open, as with a battering-ram, a breach in the wooden walls of its prison, the swathed moth is then assisted by the purchase of its spiny case to draw itself more than half-way through the opening, wherein it remains tightly wedged, while the aurelian skin, bursting at the shoulders, gives egress to the winged form. 1 Perca scandens. Note in Sharon Turner's "Sacred History of the World.' 1 STRANGE MODES OF PROGRESS. 353 Who would expect to find anywhere, save in the thinly- peopled world of monsters, a creature with legs upon its back ? Yet have two such been discovered in the world of insects : one, the bat-louse, 1 which is described as being able to trans- port itself with marvellous celerity from one end to the other of the furry forest wherein it dwells; the other, the grub of a little gall-fly, 2 which inhabits one of the berry-shaped galls common upon oak-leaves. The latter can have, of course, but little room for exercise ; but Reaumur, its discoverer, can hardly be mistaken in supposing that the singular position of its legs, in the centre of the back, is that of all others best adapted to its hollow sphere of action. Some insects, again, are not only remarkable for the number of their legs, but also for the remarkable way in which they use them. " When centipedes walk backwards, they only use their four hind legs, and these, when they walk in the usual way, are not employed, but dragged after them, like the locked wheel of a coach in driving down a hill. It was first observed, we believe, by Kirby, that a millipede, common under stones, the bark of trees, and the hollow stems of decaying plants, and provincially termed " Maggy Manyfeet," performs its serpent-like motion by extending alternate portions of its numerous legs beyond the line of the body, while those in the intervals preserve a vertical direction." 3 The fly's walk against gravity, that phenomenon by common observers so little noted, by careful ones so contradictorily explained, and imitated only by some others of the insect race, is sufficient of itself to confer upon that race a remarkable superiority over all others as walking animals. Where, above all, shall we find walkers upon water ? No- where, save in the ponds and pools and ditches and rivulets, whereon, almost daily, from spring to autumn, we may see 1 Nycteribia Hurmanni. 2 Cynips Quercus inferno. 3 " Insect Transformations." 354 NON-PROGRESSIVE MOVEMENTS. gnats and Tipulce lightly skimming, water-bugs gliding with or against the current, whirlwigs describing circles, and all performing their varied evolutions upon liquid plains with far more ease and dexterity than the most accomplished skater when those plains are rendered solid. In air, as well as on land and water, various insects exhibit peculiar movements, as well as those shared with other winged creatures. The sportive dancing of gnats and Tipulidan flies, the sailing of winged ants, the beautiful undulating suspension of the graceful Ephemerae, would appear to have no exact cor- respondence amongst feathered fliers ; while of a character no less sui generis are various wing exercises of a non-progressive character performed by insects only. Of this latter description is the flirting by the butterfly of her painted fans, the fanning of bees, and the quivering of his little transparent, black-tipped pinions by the " vibrating fly," l a tiny, scarlet-headed, black- bodied lover of the sunshine and of flowers. The purposes of the above and similar actions may still, perhaps, admit of doubt, inasmuch as they have been assigned by careful and intelligent observers to different exciting motives. By some, the butterfly has been supposed to flirt her wings simply with the same cooling intent as that wherewith a lady flirts her fan, while another considers that the " Vanessa," when she fans the air with her pinions, is inviting its entrance into their tubes and nervures, as a preparative for flight; and while, by one, the quiverings of the vibrating fly are supposed to assist its respiration, another, from having noticed these same vibra- tions to be performed only in the sunshine, regards them as expressions merely of delight. How can we so often permit our minds to stagnate for want of exercise, when even in an insect movement, and the springs which direct it, there is matter for thought, and doubt, and discovery ! Another peculiarity distinguishes the movements of some insects from those of nearly all other animals save man. This 1 Scioptera vibrans, Kirby. See Vignette. SELF-WROUGHT AIDS TO'MOTION. 355 is their power, in some instances, of constructing and availing themselves of what may be called artificial helps. Such are the aerial bridges of silken thread, and the balloons of flake, by which aeronautic spiders cross a void or ascend to the clouds. Such the silken ropes, descending or mounting by whose aid a variety of caterpillars, especially the Loopers, are enabled to break their falls from, or resume their positions upon, elevated stations ; and also of this description are the rope-ladders, spun of the same material and employed by the devouring crawler of the cabbage to scale a garden wall, or, if we please to test her ingenuity at efforts for escape, the smooth perpendicular of an imprisoning glass. The above, and all other insect movements, are, of course, to be observed at various times and seasons ; but the subject of animal motion harmonizes with this present month of Novem- ber, as well as with the two which have gone before it, for to all three appertain strong features of external movement pre- ceding arid preparatory to the external fixedness of winter. jf'n fftv swiff ^i$tr anb rrrqjin^ Oi ftf t : ttf fnljTrfr 15 an- anjt VLovfoior . All the insects of this group, excepting one, consist of Plant Bugs (Penta- tomidtt) Capsidce, &c.) of varied form and colour. The dark, long-bodied insect creeping up the pailings, is the Reduvius personatus, a bug itself, but an enemy, especially in its stage of larva, to our domestic horror Cimex hctularius. The Plant Bug, on a branch of Southern-wood below, is remarkable for a pair of singularly-shaped antennae, and its wings (not shown in the figure) are of a beautiful violet-blue : the general colour of the insect is a dark olive. FOR THOSE WHO ARE NOT OVER-NICE. " With ho ! such lugs and goblins in my life." OW that insects abroad are become compara- tively few, it may be as well to notice several of the race which are much too intimately connected with home to be entirely overlooked, though not certainly the most pleasing objects of contemplation. A STEANGE TRADITION. 357 To begin with the beginning the origin of insect vermin. There is given by a certain traveller 1 the following curious tradition, as preserved amongst a sect of Kurds who dwelt at the foot of Mount Sindshar : " When Noah's ark sprang a leak by striking against a rock in the vicinity of Mount Sindshar, and Noah despaired altogether of safety, the serpent promised to help him out of his mishap, if he would engage to feed him upon human flesh after the deluge had subsided. Noah pledged himself to do BO ; and the serpent, coiling himself up, drove his body into the fracture and stopped the leak. When the pluvious element was appeased, and all were making their way out of the ark, the serpent insisted upon the fulfilment of the pledge he had received ; but Noah, by Gabriel's advice, committed the serpent to the flames, arid, scattering its ashes in the air, there arose out of them flies, fleas, lice, bugs, and all such sorts of vermin as prey upon human blood ; and in this manner was Noah's pledge redeemed." 2 According to the above tradition, human flesh alone would have been heir to the debt for which, in his dire extremity, the venerable Noah was induced to give a bond ; but as all beasts, birds, and creeping things, were sharers in the preservation wrought by the cunning stopper of their leaky vessel, it is but fair that they also should pay a part of the tribute prospectively exacted. At all events, we find that throughout each order of animated being, from man down to the meanest insect, there is scarcely one exempt from some tormenting infestor which lives upon its vital juices. Scarce anybody who has ever noticed at all either a common black beetle or a humble-bee, can have failed to observe the shining mail of the one and the downy doublet of the other covered with a living load of small white or brownish insects, from whose attacks they are some- 1 Eulia, quoted in the " Mirror." 3 There is also a Hindu tradition, in which the serpent, instead of saving, is represented as trying to wreck the Ark. M M 358 INSECT TORMENTORS UNIVERSAL. times brought to a deplorable condition. These are mites, or Acari, attached especially to bees and beetles ; but butterflies, crickets, ants, and even the formidable dragon-fly, are all subject to the attacks of allied ^species, independent of other life-consuming enemies. Those little maudites Mtes, termed, facetiously, by a popular author, " game from the capital pastures," find a favourite cover and preserve amongst the feathers of the bird creation, which, in its numerous varieties, is a prey to insect infestors of this description almost as varied. The peacock, strutting in his gorgeous panoply of plumes, has, in common with others who are fretting daily under " splendid misery," a " thorn in the flesh," such as the most of his admirers little reck of, in the shape of a tormentor peculiar to himself (the peacock louse 1 ), peculiar also for its own very remarkable exterior. Poll Parrot or Mistress Cockatoo, when bending her head to invite our caressing fingers, has, ten to one, a less refined motive in the act than a mere love of notice. Even our little pet canary cannot always boast exemption from the " rufflers " of his race. He is sometimes seen to pluck and plume inor- dinately, without the usual incentive of a change of feathers. Now we must not attribute this to mere vanity, nor suppose that he is only smoothing his yellow satin doublet for some imaginary " at home," since it is quite as probable that certain unwelcome visitors, in the form of little red mites, are making themselves " at home " in reality under the unwilling shelter of his wing. This, however, with a real pet bird one, that is to say, kept with cleanliness is a rare if not unknown occurrence, for the above tormentor of imprisoned warblers is chiefly found in dirty or neglected cages. On this account it needs especial care never to introduce a feathered favourite into an abode which has been pre-occupied, without subjecting it, first, to proper ablution and fumigation. 1 Ricinus Favonis, PREYEES UPON MAN. 359 Ascending to quadrupeds, it is needless to whisper in ears polite the name of that exciting cause, or causes, under which our " Marlboroughs " are apt to forget their high breeding, and our " King Charles's " to encroach on their parlour pre- rogatives. Grimalkin, with her own nine lives, has been said by Lin- naeus to possess a happy immunity from the burthen of carrying other lives about her; but we are more inclined to believe, with less distinguished naturalists, that while Puss is imbibing the yet warm juices of a mouse, a hungry flea may be similarly employed in sucking up her own. We come now to the insect preyers on lordly man, of whom the lordliest, the kings and potentates of earth, have furnished some striking and most horrible examples of how the meanest and most despicable of earth's denizens have been employed by the Almighty Hand to lower the pride and reprove the cruelty of tyrants and oppressors. Antiochus Epiphanes, Sylla, the two Herods, and the second Philip of Spain, the great persecutor of the Protestants, are all recorded to have been frightfully distinguished in their deaths as in their lives, by falling victims to the pedicular disease. Various instances are related of another disease, somewhat resembling, though not similar, in which mites or Acari, lodge beneath the skin. One of these we shall briefly repeat, though often quoted, from Mouffet's " Theatre of Insects," because a natural cause is assigned for the infestation there described, such as would seem wanting in the cases of those tormentors tormented, on whom the finger of God was supposed to have been supernaturally laid. Of " the Lady Penruddocke " our narrator tells us, that Acari, or mites, swarmed in every part of her body, head, eyes, nose, lips, gums, and soles of her feet, tormenting her day and night, till, in spite of every remedy, all the flesh of her body was consumed, and death relieved her. 300 BUG AND BUGBEAR. Mouffet supposes that the insects were generated by drink- ing too copiously of goat's milk ; a cause seemingly not impro- bable, from a species of this insect 1 being sometimes found in milk. As connected with kings and rulers, we must advert to the tributary lice of the ancient kings of Mexico and incas of Peru, of whom it has been related, that they found no other means of ridding their subjects of these infestors, save by the animal imposition of a tribute to consist of a certain quantum of the living " specie" Bags full of them were found by Cortez in the palace of Montezuma and in the magazines of King Axajacatil. Torquemada and other historians assign, however, to this strange poll-ism a motive very different to the above. It was imposed, say they, only on beggars, because Montezuma, who could not suffer idleness in any of his subjects, was determined that even those wretched people who would not labour should be thus employed. Reader, have thy midnight slumbers ever been disturbed by ghost or goblin? Unless thou art of the few whose " visionary eyes" have been opened, thou wilt most likely re- spond in the negative; and yet thou must have been favoured almost above the common lot, if a " fearful shape," whose name bears the same alarming import, has never " in dead of night" stalked up and down thy curtains, and with intent far more bloody than ever midnight spectre was known or sup- posed to entertain. Let us change the question : Have you ever been alarmed, or worse, by that familiar of London, Paris, Madrid, or Lisbon, yclept, in English parlance, a bug ? If so, you have been visited by goblin, for ghost or goblin does bug, in Celtic, signify. Nor, till in times comparatively recent, has that six-legged " terror," which creepeth by night, been thus appellated. Of the common root of bug arid bugbear a curious proof is 1 Acarus lactis. MARKED BUG-CACTHER. 361 noticed in the " Insect Miscellanies, " namely, that in Mat- thew's Bible, the fifth verse of the 91st Psalm is rendered " Thou shalt not nede be afraide of any bugs by night ; " and in this same sense the word must have been put by Shakespeare into the mouth of the Prince of Denmark : " With ho! such bugs and goblins in my life." Before we leave their favourite locality, the bed of down which they convert into a bed of nettles, let's see what is this moving object 1 on the floor, by the bedside. 'Tis nothing but a bit of rubbish, a token of the housemaid's negligence, a mingled piece conglomerate of flue, and dust, and feathers, set in motion by the draught from underneath the door. Yet, no ; never did wind create such careful motion ; and see ! There is a leg a living leg and now another, protruded from the cloak of shreds and patches. Never did lame beggar hitch in -his gait more piteously. Perhaps 'tis a great wounded spider caught in the remnants of his own snare. But whatever be the cripple, let's uncloak him. Oh, the rogue ! impostor ! hypocrite ! No sooner is he stripped of his disguise of dirt, than he takes to his heels as if the devil was behind him ; but he shall not escape us ; and now that he is fairly caught, let us carry him before the light for examination. And, truly, .a more ill-looking miscreant, and ferocious withal, was never " pulled up " at Bow Street ; his eye, especially, has murder in it, and murder, doubtless, was his design. What other could he have when lurking in disguise, like a cowardly assassin, beside a bed ? He is self- condemned, let not the monster live. Yet the monster is but an insect after all ; as such, shall we not spare him as beneath our anger? True; but ill-favoured as he is, our prisoner, in relation to ourselves, is innocent ; nay, he is more, he is, to us, a friend and benefactor in disguise j while of our enemy, the 1 Reduvius personatus. 362 FIELD AND GARDEN BUGS. bug, although of the same kindred, he is also, in disguise, the deadly foe, destroyer, and devourer. It was in cunning pursuit of this, his darling prey, that we found him, under cover of his rubbish canopy, cautiously advancing, that he might spring, unheeded, on his victim; and for this reason, Reduvius per- sonatus, thou masked bug-catcher, we release, and bid thee go and prosper. It is in its first form of larva that this wily Reduvius, or bug-catching bug, may occasionally be observed engaged as above described in its usual vocation. " The fierce look of this creature is then rendered," says Kirby, * ' more hateful by its ocelli, or simple eyes, having a pale iris round a daik pupil." Our figure 1 is that of the perfect insect, which is often to be found on palings in the month of May. Before we take our leave of the extensive and ill-famed family of bug, we are bound to rescue it from that common species of injustice to which we owe the proverb of " Give a dog an ill name and hang him." For this purpose, leaving the pent-up precincts of the city for sweet fields and flower- gardens, we must introduce thee, Reader, to a numerous tribe, which, though bearing the odium of the same ugly patronymic, are by no means ugly creatures. On the contrary, and as if they borrowed variety and elegance of form, as well as bril- liancy of colour, from the plants and blossoms they frequent, these plant-bugs are amongst the very prettiest of our English insects. In place of the loathsome wingless platitude of our domestic town torments, their " country cousins " are adorned, for the most part, with exquisitely delicate and iridescent wings, protected, when at rest, by membranous cases, which in various species present almost every variety of gay, as well as sober colouring. In short, with some general features of resemblance, these respective denizens of light and darkness are as much contrasted with each other, as are the darkness and the light themselves. 1 See Vignette, PERFORMING FLEAS. 363 Throughout the summer plant-bugs abound ; certain kinds of them usually frequenting certain plants. Several of similar form, but varied in colour, red, black, green, are almost always to be found upon the southern-wood. They are common also, the green especially, on umbelliferous flowers ; and there is a pretty brown species peculiar to the thistle, with four delicately mottled membranous wings. Though always vegetable frequenters, these insects are not, at least, always vegetable feeders ; their sharp beak-like suckers (some- thing resembling those of aphides) being sometimes employed upon aphides themselves. In magnitude, as well as brilliancy of colour, the tropic bugs, as well as tropic butterflies, confessedly excel our own ; but for the blue bug of China we have one scarcely less beautiful, the blue bug of England, 1 which flies in the July sunshine, or is found resting upon heath or trees. 2 Now, for a word or two about that sanguinary little monster, the Flea, which, like other sanguinary monsters of a larger growth, has been, perhaps, of all insects the most distinguished. Stands it not recorded in history how that an individual flea was once honoured by a cannon-shot from a female royal hand, that of the celebrated Queen Christian ? and is not the brass piece of Lilliputian ordnance used on that memorable occasion exhibited in proof thereof, perhaps, to this very day, in the capital of Sweden ? Has not " a company " of fleas, for many years, attracted, by its unrivalled performances, the curious sight-seers of London ? Have they not there beheld a flea quadrille danced to the fiddles of a flea orchestra ? Have they not laughed at two pulician combatants, sword in hand, adjusting a point of 1 Pentafoma ccerulea. 2 The flying bugs of Hindostan, resembling our own domestic species in shape, size, and scent, are described by Bishop Heber as coming out in nightly swarms from every bush, entering the windows and crowding round the candles. 364 PULICTAN POWER honour? and (oh! the burlesque on human greatness !) have they not there seen a Napoleon mounted on a flea charger ? The flea, as compared with the generality of insects, is a long-liver, for the Italian, Bertolotti, speaks of having kept one for twenty-three months, when it died apparently of age, having grown gradually darker till it became nearly black. In the days of its prime, its herculean task was to track a man of war ; as its strength declined, its task-master lightened that stupendous load to ten links of gold chain, and on growing yet weaker, the venerable prisoner was released even from this splendid misery ; but then, alas ! its leaps, from two hundred times the length of its own body, could not clear an inch, and at last it could scarcely crawl across its prison. We all owe our consequence to some sort of power ; and to the power of its muscles is the flea indebted for the best part of its celebrity. The extraordinary amount of muscular force, as displayed in its stupendous leaps, attracted very early the curious and observant; and Socrates measuring the leap of a flea figures in the "Clouds " of the satirical Aristophanes. And, in sooth, our agile little vaulter can take a leap worth measuring, for in reaching to the distance of two hundred times its own length, it is, in proportion to its size, as if a man should leap from three to four hundred yards. This marvellous power must have first put it into the head of some ingenious person to display both his own mechanic skill and the flea's strength, by turning the latter into a little draught animal, in which capacity it has been proved capable of drawing three hundred and sixty times its own weight. Mouffet, writing in the reign of Elizabeth, mentions an Eng- lish mechanic named Mark, who constructed a chain of gold as long as his finger, which with lock and key were dragged along by a single flea. In Bingley's "Animal Biography" are related other the like instances of human ingenuity and insect prowess ; and VARIETY OF FLEAS. 365 Latreille celebrates the strength and courage of another Samsonian flea, which drew a silver mounted cannon, and stood fire, unmoved, when the piece of loaded artillery was let off. Of fleas there are reckoned at least a dozen species, though some, perhaps, distinguishable only to the eye of an entomo- logist. Those which infest birds and beasts, and those which honour us with their peculiar preference, are each distinct kinds, and are probably therefore endowed with tastes too discriminating to abide long in, even if they emigrate to foreign quarters. Comfort herein for the delicately apprehen- sive, who, having no dogs of their own, are apt to feel fidgety and irritable in company of those which belong to their neighbours. rb$ erf juffof ftixi musflY far a stiffpfe-fliasc in amtfsf . The insect Ogre her represented is the fierce and wily grub of the Ant-lion (Formica Leo). On the fragment in the foreground it is shown in deformity unveiled, and more backward is seen one of the cleverly-constructed pitfalls in which it is accustomed to lie buried, all but its extended jaws, for the en- trapment of its prey. The globular object towards the left is the puparium^ or pupa-case, of this remarkable creature, itself remarkable for the smallness of its size, as compared with that of the imago (winged insect), which is shown in process of emergement from it. lu its perfect expansion, it soars above the Ant-lion Fly complete. STORY OF AN OGRE. VER a certain republic in the south of Europe there reigned, once upon a time, as cruel a tyrant as ever filled an absolute throne, or was ever hurled by his subjects from one of those cumbrous seats of a fashion now in course of explosion. NOVEL DANGERS TERRIBLE. 367 This tyrant was that shadowy potentate called Fear; and inasmuch as the people over whom he had usurped dominion were located in the midst of various gigantic enemies, and were exposed at all times to many overwhelming dangers, it might have been thought, though quite erroneously, that they could hardly ever be exempt from the same uneasy rule. It was not, however, the fear of Death always at hand, under any one of his familiar shapes, that ever caused a moment's re- flection, much less uneasiness, to a people so entirely occupied, as was that we are speaking of, in the business of life; but at the particular period of our relation, Danger, and Death behind him, began suddenly to trip up their heels in a manner so new and so mysterious, as to make the most heedless look very seriously about them, and hence only arose the panic Terror, which came for awhile to lord it over them. The capital of their republic, which was built upon Italian soil, we shall call Monticello; and it was upon one of the principal thoroughfares communicating with this city, that the common enemy first began that unusual and ill-mannered mode of attack to which we have alluded. This highway had been traversed by many successive generations, to whom nothing had thereon befallen, excepting accidents of usual occurrence ; but one day, as a party of some eight or ten individuals were quietly pursuing their way along what they supposed to be, as hereto- fore, a solid causeway, they came suddenly upon the edge of a deep and wide abyss. Thus taken by surprise, two or three lost their footing, and rolled at once down the shelving side of this strange pitfall. The others might perhaps have maintained their equilibrium, but, blinded and overthrown by a shower of sand, rising from the hollow before them, as if from the crater of a volcano, they also, with exception of one who returned to tell the tale, were precipitated down the fatal descent. The road whereon this alarming occurrence took place was speedily abandoned, it was made, in fact, impassable ; but in N N P1CCOLETTA. whatever direction the stream of life was turned, there, with magic rapidity and in a mode quite inexplicable, yawning gulfs of a similar description were opened for its interruption. It was customary, in the republican nation of which Monti- cello was the metropolis, to confide the care of all the infant population to public nurses, who were usually the best nurses in the world ; but under the alarming visitation of which we are telling, even the care of these faithful guardians began to relax with their courage, and they would sometimes allow their charges as well as themselves to die nearly of starvation, for fear lest, in collecting food, they might become food in their own persons for the gaping pitfalls or their mysterious fabricators, It was usual also in fine weather to carry the nurselings, for air and sunshine, beyond the city walls ; but since the reign of the panic, they had been nearly all, as in time of siege, immured within their close apartments. But it had never so fared with the infant charges under the keeping of one youthful nurse, who, rather than they should lack anything, had continued to encounter all extraordinary as well as ordinary dangers, and that, hitherto, with the most perfect impunity. This kind and brave-hearted creature we shall call Piccoletta, because she was but a very little personage, and because, as before noticed, she and her compatriots were of Italian birth. Well, this Piccoletta, who, according to her deserts, was a-general favourite of the city, left it as usual one fine morning, in order to seek provision in the adjacent country; but night came and passed, and so did also the next day, without her re- appearance, and then every body thought she must have fallen a victim to their newly-besetting enemies ; but on the second night, the sentinels on guard perceived in the moon-light a limping object approach the city, which, though magnified at first, by their ruling fear, into one of the dreaded trap-makers, they soon joyfully recognized as the missing Piccoletta. Nothing could exceed the delight of her neighbours at seeing her again, except, perhaps, their desire to know what had befallen her ; PICCOLETTA'S ADVENTURES. 369 and when a little recovered from fatigue, and the injuries she had received in her expedition, she gratified their curiosity by the following relation : "You may remember, my dear friends," said she, how I got up by sunrise the day before yesterday and went out by myself into the country. You know, too, that I never, on my own account, had any more fears about those terrible pitfalls, than if such things were still, as they used to be, quite un- known ; but, somehow, on that morning, as soon as I got beyond the shadow of our city walls, my heart seemed to sink within me, and I should have returned directly, only was ashamed. Instead, however, of going on steadily as usual, I every now and then climbed to the top of some rock or emi_ nence, to obtain an extensive view, and wherever I saw before me a dark roundish shadow, there I fancied a pitfall opened, and took a round-about way to avoid it. This tired me not a little, but I was determined to proceed as far as I had intended; that was, to the clump of elder-trees where some of our black cattle have been lately at pasture, and from whence I have often brought fresh supplies of honied milk. " Judge, however, of my disappointment, when, after so much toil to reach them, I found the elders all cut down (by the hands, doubtless, of those two-legged giants who do more mischief in our beautiful world than all the other creatures put together), and nothing left of those useful animals I had come to seek, except a few trampled remains which it made my heart ache to look upon. It was too late to go further, but not bear- ing to return as I went, I resolved to take quite a new beat home, in hopes either of meeting with another herd of our milch-kine, or of finding some of that sweet vegetable food which serves us at once for milk and bread. I was intent, eyes and mind, on this search, and had forgot nearly all about the pitfalls, when all on a sudden, I found myself in the midst of the most delicious perfume not of flowers only, but of the very thing I was seeking and saw, to my delight, that I was 370 THE PITFALL. coming to a large oak-tree covered at the top with a woodbine in full blossom. I knew by the mingled scent, that the leaves, both of tree and creeper, must be covered with that precious manna which kind Providence rains for our support. I then began to ascend the tree, taking a winding course to make the ascent more easy, and resting often enough, I can tell you, before I could reach the first leafy cluster of oak and woodbine intermixed. Then I had a delicious rest, and a delicious meal indeed, after which, I took care to load myself with as much as I could possibly carry of the abundant store around me. " I meant to descend as soon as I had done so, but what with walking and climbing, I was too weary to move, and, after such a plentiful meal, began to feel drowsy. The heat of the day and the warm scent of the manna and flowers made me grow more and more heavy, till at last I fell fast asleep. " How long my nap lasted I cannot tell, but I was first aroused by the sensation of falling, and then entirely awoke in terrible earnest, by coming in violent contact with a something so hard that I seemed almost knocked to atoms. As soon as I recovered a little from this tremendous shock, I looked about me, and where do you think I found myself but in one of those frightful pitfalls I had been, on setting out, so careful to avoid? " On what was below me I dared not for some time to cast an eye ; but when I did, oh ! I thought I should have died with terror ! for what should I see at the bottom of the pit but a hideous Ogre, with a pair of horrible pointed tusks, longer than his own head or any of our bodies, and all besmeared with the blood of some unhappy creature like ourselves, which he seemed at that moment drinking in, just as our cattle draw in the sap of the elder and other trees. " The Ogre was a long time occupied with his sickening repast, but at length he let fall the body on which he had been engaged, and rolled his great eyes all around the cavern. He was coming, I thought, to drag me down, but I suppose I escaped his notice, for he returned again to his last victim, as I THE 00 RE. 371 at first imagined, to devour it, but instead of that he only tossed it several times over, and at last, by a tremendous jerk, threw it out of his den. Then he lay down, and pushing and shoving his great body into the deep soft sand at bottom of the pit, buried himself entirely all but his horrible tusks, which remained sticking up above the surface. For a long while I watched in breathless terror for his next proceeding, but, as he continued quite motionless, I flattered myself that this was his way of going to sleep ; and now or never, thought I, I must make a trial to escape. I examined the bank above my head, and seeing on its smooth surface a piece of projecting stone, set foot on the steep ascent with a view to grasp it, but on my first step a mass of dislodged sand fell rolling downwards. How I shuddered lest the Ogre should be roused ! and so, in truth, he was that is, if he had ever been asleep for instantly rising to meet the stream of sand descending, came a volley of the same, thrown up, seemingly, by the tossing of the monster's broad flat head, as he still kept wallowing in his soft bed at bottom of the den. I was almost blinded, and thrown nearly off my station, but I contrived to keep it, and in a short time all was again clear and quiet, and nothing but those terrible tusks above the sand showed signs of a living thing in the cavern, except my poor trembling little self. " If the Ogre's sleep was real, perhaps he had resumed it ; but whether or not, I dared not again to set foot on the loose surface of my prison-wall, but kept crouching on my ledge of stone, till I grew as cold as it, and wished myself as senseless, that I might not hear, as every moment I expected, another stir below me, and feel myself being pelted down into the monster's clutches. But hours, seeming weeks, went on, and the Ogre remained still as death, till, as I supposed by the increased obscurity of the cavern, the sun had set. Then, suddenly, it grew darker still ; I heard a distant roll of thunder, and there fell into the pitfall some great drops of rain. The monster at the bottom began to stir. Ah ! thought I, it's all 372 PICCOLETTA'S ESCAPE. over with me now ! and the dust which I felt again in motion assured me that my fate was at hand. I had scarcely power left to cling to my last holdfast, but cling I did, and presently became aware, from a terrific roaring of the branches of the oak above, that it was now a violent gust of wind, and not the movements of the Ogre, which disturbed the sand and was whirling it in eddies round the pit. " Then came a tremendous crash, and my sole support shook under me. ' Now/ groaned I, ' I am lost indeed ! ' but in that moment I was saved. Something falling from above had nearly shut out all remaining daylight from the mouth of the pitfall, which it lay across, and nearly covered. Here and there, however, I could catch a glimpse of light, and, when my terror was a little abated, discovered with infinite joy that the top of my hideous trap was nearly covered by a bough torn by the storm from the oak above. Grasping with eagerness this unlooked-for help, I speedily abandoned my dangerous station, and a moment afterwards heard the stone which had supported me rolling to the bottom of the pit. " Hope renewed my strength, and by turns climbing and traversing the branches of my saving arm of oak, I soon found myself again on solid ground, and, with the utmost speed I could put forth, made my way homewards across the sandy plain around the pitfall." The veil of mystery was now drawn in part from before the dreadful pitfalls ; but the death which lurked within them was not considered, by most of the listeners to Piccoletta's tale, as a whit the less formidable in the palpable shape it had now assumed. One old sage among them seemed, however, of a different opinion. " My counsel is, that a strong party should leave the city, and, closely encircling the first pitfall to be found, compel the wily occupant either to stay within and starve, or come out and fall an easy prey to our united force." A numerous party was assembled for the first expedition AN EXPEDITION. 373 against the Ogres, and, by her own particular desire, Piccoletta went with it. Under her guidance, the troop marched first towards the pitfall whence she had escaped, not with any view of attacking the Ogre who had occupied, but who they believed to have been dislodged from it by the storm, but for the purpose of strengthening their bodies, if not their hearts, by a plentiful meal off the manna, or sweet bread, of the oak from which their little pioneer had fallen. Having accomplished, without interruption, this desirable preliminary, they had not proceeded much farther before they came upon another excavation of which the ugly character, could they have doubted it, was pretty clearly evidenced by the appearance, near upon its verge, of several dead bodies, the cast-out remains of their fellow-citizens. Here they came to a halt, and formed a circle as close and as deep as their numbers would permit, around the mouth of the pit-fall, which had been constructed, as usual, in a sandy soil. Thus they remained, still as mice ; and quiet as a mouse, too, remained the cat-lik. Ogre (if Ogre was there) at the bottom of his cavern, which, from the prudent distance of their position, his besiegers were unable to discern. Hour after hour passed, till from very inaction the courage of the surrounding party, which had arrived in tolerable spirits, began to flag. Declining daylight did not augment their valour ; and, as surrounding objects grew indis- tinct, the passing of a moth or bat even the rustle of a leaf sent a tremor through the fearful circle. It would have been broken, likely enough, by desertion, under cover of darkness, but for dread of other pitfalls, or their makers, stalking about under the same nocturnal cloak. The night, however, ended without one alarm, except from phantom fears. Piccoletta was the first who suggested that, perhaps, after all, they were only surrounding an empty trap ; and was the first also, when morning came, to creep softly and lightly towards its circum- ference, to ascertain how this might be. She seemed right in 374 A MYSTERIOUS OBJECT. her conjecture no ogre was to be seen at bottom of the pit; but, where the monster usually made his lair, she perceived, as she thought, a round object, like a ball of sand. Piccoletta was curious as well as courageous. She proposed to a comrade that, by the assistance of each other, they should descend to the bottom of the pitfall ; and when the latter (as was not very surprising) looked somewhat shy of the attempt, our little heroine, half-stepping, half-sliding down the descent, effected her bold purpose by herself. Bold as she was, she nevertheless shook, for a minute, from top to toe, when she found herself standing alone in the very print-mark left by the monstrous body of the late tenant of the den. But cause for alarm seemed none, as she evidently had the pit-fall entirely to herself, with nothing whatever near her except what looked below, as it had appeared from above, a great ball of sand great, in comparison with Piccoletta, or with any of her companions, but very small, as compared with a creature like the Ogre. On the matter of her re-ascent Piccoletta felt no concern, being assured that it would prove the easiest operation in the world, when performed free of the monster's presence and his arresting volleys. She began, therefore, with great composure, to examine the brown ball which had raised her curiosity, and, on feeling its surface, discovered, to her surprise, that, instead of being hard, it was soft and yielding to the touch. Meanwhile, the people above grew curious on their parts to see what was going on within the pitfall, and some of them, spite of their fears, drew closer to its edge, from which a few fragments, detached by their weight, fell crumbling downwards. Piccoletta looked up with a smile, partly of encouragement to her companions, partly, perhaps, of self-complacency at her own superior courage. At that moment, she heard a slight noise beside her. Turning round, she beheld the ball in heaving motion, and, presently, through a rent in its circumference, appeared a living head. It was not the head of the Ogre ; but to Picco- A BRILLIANT APPARITION. 375 letta, in her terror, it looked something like it, and she thought even that she saw the points of the horrible tusks she had once seen so hideously employed. Then all her courage deserted her, and she fell senseless to the ground. The lookers-on above shrank backwards in dismay ; and, as if they had beheld the Ogre himself striding up the sides of his den, broke up their circle huddled together in confusion and rapidly retreated. Presently, however, as if ashamed of their cowardice, they stood still, and again turned their faces towards the quarter of apprehended danger. Not a thing was visible on the smooth sandy plain around the mouth of the pitfall ; nor, for awhile, above it; but then, rising suddenly from the centre of the hollow, a winged form shot upwards, like a sky-rocket. It approached, glittering in the morning sun, then hovered high above the wondering and admiring crowd. " A genius ! a genius ! " they exclaimed ; " a good genius, who has killed the Ogre, and saved us from destruction ! " Even as they spoke, the brilliant apparition descended slowly from its aerian height, and, on four resplendent wings of im- mense expansion, again hung suspended now close above their heads. But not long did it thus hover its brooding was as that of a kite over a flock of doves, and presently, kite-like, it siezed its victim, lifting it from amidst the deluded multitude by help of sharp talons and a pair of crooked tusks, terrible as those of the dreaded Ogre. Their former fears swallowed up by this new alarm, the discomfited force of Monticello hastened in confusion towards their city; but, before they reached it, one more of their number was carried of by the same winged assailant, or another resembling it, and rising, in like manner, from another of the ogre pitfalls. What had become, meanwhile, of Piccoletta ? This was an inquiry which, after they were safe within the walls of their capital, suggested itself for the first time to those who had left o o 376 A NEW ALARM. her in the lurch. When, however, they had time to think of it, they felt shame enough, as they well might, at their base desertion, to control even their new fears of their new enemy, in defiance of whom a small party speedily retraced their steps, and reached, without interruption, the pitfall round which they had been stationed. But there was no Piccoletta to be found, and not a thing was visible at bottom of the excavation ; not even the wonderful ball, from whose heaving throes and living outbirth they had recoiled in terror, before the ascent of the winged form, which, instead of a good, they now looked on, and with pretty sufficient reason, as an evil genius. An hour or two's fruitless search ended in the persuasion that Piccoletta was lost for ever; and, sorrowful for the loss of their little townsfellow, and crest-fallen at the cowardice to which, perhaps, it was owing, the party turned again towards home. The summer sun had now attained its height, and the baffled Monticellians were toiling onward under its scorching beams, their dread of pitfalls, ogres, and genii, all nearly overpowered by vexation and fatigue, when suddenly their path was over- shadowed ; a flapping of heavy wings was heard above their heads, and at the same moment there fell amongst them a something from the stroke of which several individuals fell prostrate. The others hastily recoiled ; and in the space thus cleared, there appeared in the now sunny road (for the shade had passed away with the onward flight of the object which had caused it) the miraculous ball which they had seen last within the pitfall. It exhibited, as then, a rent in the side, and was now, moreover, somewhat crushed and battered. So fearfully connected was that ball of wonder with the den of the Ogre, and with the apparition of the cruel winged genius, that not one of the gazers dared approach, much less touch it; and, on beholding it again in motion, all drew back, as before, in consternation. A voice was heard, it proceeded from the interior of the ball, and, strangely as it sounded, there was something in its THE BALL OF ENCHANTMENT. 377 tone familiar to those who heard it. Could it be the voice of her they had been seeking ? It was none other ; and alarm was all forgotten in joyful surprise when, peeping through the rent in the misshapen sphere, they saw the little head of Pic- coletta. Without waiting to inquire how she had got into that world of wonder, or how she had fallen in, with it, amongst her friends, some of the latter lifted her, ball and all, upon their shoulders, and carried her, rejoicingly, to the city. The history of her second escape was soon told. When she awoke from her sleep of terror, on the bed of sand in the pitfall where her friends had left her with so little cere- Kiony, she looked first at the ball whose issuing tenant had so sorely frightened her ; but, through the yawning rent in its side, saw, or thought she saw, that it was now empty. Then she looked at the sandy walls, which rose sloping round her, and, seeing all clear, lost no time in beginning to scale them. This, though a very laborious, she found (as she had expected) no impracticable task, and had half achieved it, when she heard in a tree at hand, the well-known knocking of the great Pecchio. 1 This time, from her precarious position, it made her heart sink, and, what was worse, caused her foot to slip, so that she fell rolling with a stream of sand to the bottom of the pit. The Pecchio heard and saw her, and, darting from his station on the trunk of an elm, lighted on the edge of the cavity, devouring her with his great eyes, and ready to swallow her down his great throat. There was only one place of refuge open for the trembling Piccoletta, and that was the ball beside her, into which, in her desperate strait, she was right glad to creep. But the Pecchio was not to be so easily baulked of his coveted morsel. He dipped his enormous red head into the pitfall, seized both the ball and its shaking occupant, rose with them into the air, and dropped them, by good luck for Picco- letta, in the midst of her acquaintance. This was an explanation, simple enough, of Piccoletta's 1 Pecchio Italian for Woodpecker. 378 PICCOLETTA AND THE PECGHIO. entrance into, and her exit from, the wonderful ball ; but its chief mysteries were still unravelled. Who could tell what that ball had to do with the Ogre and his pitfall? how it first came there? how a winged shape, with pinions of ex- pansion many times wider than itself, could have issued, apparently, from the globe? and how the Ogre's remains were found in its interior? Not, certainly, the citizens of Monticello, to whom all these things were as the work of a magician. A pantomime with its machinery exposed would be a sorry spectacle, stripped at once of its amusing and surprising cha- racter ; but there are certain pantomimic incidents of which the theatre is the insect world, and in which the part of harlequin is played by Nature, that cannot be thus marred, for the more they are elucidated the more do they raise our admira- tion. Of this description are the marvels which compose the history of the " Formica Leo/' " Ant-lion," or Ogre of Ants, on which our " Tale of an Ogre " has its foundation. The Ant-lion is not a frequenter, now-a-days, of Britain ; not exactly, therefore, a subject for our exhibition ; but it has a place in British catalogues, and having, as it would thence appear, been found once, it may still have lurking-places in our island. This conjecture is considered the more probable from its being a native of central France and Switzerland as well as more southern Europe. At all events, it is sufficiently rare in this country to constitute a " Lion " indeed among English insects, and, as such, better worth the seeking. The wily and cruel grub of the Ant-lion 1 (the Ogre of the pitfall) is a grey- coloured ring-bodied insect, in form not very dissimilar to a woodlouse, only much larger, and with six, instead of many legs ; but its most conspicuous distinction consists in a pair of tremendous jaws, each pointed and curved like a sickle, and forming together a forceps-like weapon, wherewith, being tubular, it can at once seize, pierce, and suck the blood, or, 1 See Vignette. THE ANT-LION. 379 more properly, the acid juice of the ants it preys on. The snare or pitfall of the ant-lion consists of a funnel-shaped excavation, scooped out of sand, in size varied, but most often of about three inches diameter by two deep. In the bottom of this den the cunning creature awaits its prey ; and, not content with the screen afforded by its encircling walls of sand, is accustomed to conceal its whole body within a deep bed of the same material, leaving only its formidable jaws above the surface. When an unfortunate ant happens, by treading too near this terrible trap, to dislodge from its edge a few particles of sand, these in rolling to the bottom apprise the lurker of its victim's proximity. Then, forthwith, more active measures are adopted to ensure the latter's downfall, its concealed enemy beginning to toss up, by repeated jerkings of its head, successive showers of sand, whereby the busy little traveller is sure, almost, to be precipi- tated into the pit and jaws of its wily destroyer. When its juices are all extracted, the carcase of the victimized insect is thrown out of the murderer's den. alt then Lift lirr oittlicir 5 \ 9 - The insects assembled ia this Vignette afford only average specimens of Nature's decorative skill, but serve to illustrate the three modes above men- tioned of insect adornment. In the Moth Caterpillar, with its goldfinch colours (scarlet, yellow, black, white, and brown), resting on a branch of elm, we have an example of gay painting wanting permanence. This latter quality is supplied in the Ruby-tailed Wasp (Chrysis ignita) on the paling. Above, are two larvae (pseudo-caterpillars) of the Currant Saw-fly (JKematm Ribes"), their skins of greenish yellow, studded with raised dots of shining black. On the nettle-stalk adjacent hangs the gilded chrysalis of a Tortoiseshell Butterfly ( Vanessa Urticai) ; and above, flying upwards, its superior wings laden with seeming gold, is one of the little Moths (TYneufe) come of caterpillars which feed on the bark of Birch-trees. Also inscribed in mimic gold is the Greek y, which gives name to the larger Moth (Plusia gamma}, seen on wing beneath the flower-head of Knapweed ^(Phrygia nigra\ seated on which, her closed pinions "freaked" on their reverse, not with gold, but silver, is a brown Fri- tillary (Argynnis Ad'tppe). The only specimen of insect Carving for which room has been here found is one of the sculptured eggs of the y Moth on a leaf of Knapweed. THE TEMPLE OF NATURE. 381 PAINTING, CARVING, AND GILDING. HE Temple of Nature is no plain puritanic place of worship. It is rather the model of a gorgeous cathedral, and, like a sacred edifice of the latter description, it stands distinguished by a profusion of adornment worthy of the mighty fabric. Flowing draperies of foliage, hung on high as curtains or as banners floors tesselated with flowery mosaic, or bespread with verdant velvet massive pillars and slender shafts marbled with painted lichen and entwined by graceful creepers all these combine, while they immeasurably eclipse the beauty, to attest the origin of Gothic art. As with this glorious fane, so it is with the worshippers of every degree which are found assembled beneath its aerial canopy. Beauty and variety are the prevailing characteristics of living things ; and if in dignity and grace of form man and a few of the larger animals must be confessed pre-eminent, we find in diversity of shape and brilliancy of colouring a striking augmentation as we descend, relatively to size, in the scale of created beings. Amongst the most beautifully painted of the caterpillar race are those from which spring the elegant and distinguished tribe of Hawk-moths, known also as Sphinxes, from the form and attitudes, elsewhere described, of these their no less distinguished larvae. None, perhaps, among them, are more tastefully deco- rated than that of the " privet," 1 with his doublet of the most brilliant apple-green laced by oblique stripes of white and purple, further adorned along the sides by orange-circled spiracles or 1 Sphinx Ligusfri. See Vignette to l< A Midsummer Day's Dream." 382 PAINTING OF CATERPILLARS. breathing-holes, and finished at the nether extremity by a black and yellow horn. Little inferior as respects colour is the garb of the Privet's cousin of the lime-tree. 1 His surtout also is of green, subdued towards the sides, but on the back so vivid as to dim by com- parison the brightness of the newest leaves which open round him. His pervading hue is usually variegated on each side by seven oblique stripes of yellowish-white and crimson, his small mitre-shaped head is edged with white, and his six claws are tinged, like the tips of Aurora's fingers, with rosy red. His horn, or tail, is bright blue, and the whole surface of his body is dotted with regular rows of small tubercles, giving to the skin the appearance of shagreen. More common specimens of showy caterpillars are the growth of every garden. Most common of all, the speckled feeders on the cabbage, the striped " lacqueys," and the black and yellow spotted " magpies," which commit their leaf larcenies on the gooseberry and currant. Apropos of spotted caterpillars and gooseberry and currant bushes, we may notice that, frequently besetting the latter, and reducing their leaves to perfect skele- tons, are certain other black-spotted varlets, which we mention here for the sake of noticing that their spots, or dots, which are very shining, are raised above the surface of their greenish- yellow skins, forming thus another sort of shagreen to that which clothes some of the Sphinxes. This ornamental apparel they are accustomed, on their last moult, to exchange for a plain one, " as people," says Reaumur, " when they advance in years, become usually more simple in their dress than when they were young." There are few specimens of the flower- like or water-colour painting, if we may so call it, which we are now reviewing, that display more vivid tints, or more elegantly-pencilled patterns, than are sometimes to be found on the bodies of 1 Smerinthus Tilice. See Vignette to " Insect Movements." PAINTING OF SPIDERS. 383 spiders, such of them as are frequenters of the garden and the field. The ungraceful forms of those among the same tribe which are accustomed to abide in dark places are clothed in skins of corresponding dulness ; but those which live and lurk amongst leaves and flowers seem to have stolen of their lively colours. Green, green and white, red and yellow, red and white, or varied browns, in regular and tasteful markings, adorn most commonly a variety of these spinners in the sun- shine or the leafy shade. Amongst the less gay, but not least remarkably-painted of this wily race, we cannot overpass that notable hunter, striped (in black and white) like a zebra, and leaping like a tiger, which is sure in the early sunshine of the year to be seen bask- ing upon walls and window-ledges, ready to pounce upon the first unlucky fly tempted to the same spot by the same enliven- ing and unwonted warmth. 1 As one of the harbingers of summer, we always look a welcome on this saltatory lover of the sun, or perhaps only of the prey the sun procures him ; and, for the same reason, we first espy with equal gladness his highly distinguished or distinguishable little cousin, the scarlet Satin Mite, 2 whose showy doublet loses nothing by contrast with the ground he traverses. On the order Neuroptera, including dragon, scorpion, and lacewing flies, the pencil of Nature has laid some of her most brilliant colours, wanting only breadth to attract more general attention. The linear trunks of dragon-flies are variegated, according to their species, with yellow, blue, green, and red, each accompanied more or less with black, and exhibit in the peculiar clearness and sharpness of their mode of inlay the appearance more of mosaic than of surface painting. But it is not either our province, or our purpose, or desire, to wander far, even descriptively, from home ; and it is time 1 See Vignette to " Spiders in their Analogies.' a Tromlidium holosericum. 384 MOSAIC OF BUTTERFLIES. now to end our brief and most imperfect notices of insect painting, chiefly of the British School, by a word or two on the most admired and most permanent of all Nature's per- formances in this department of her grand atelier the colouring, namely, of butter-flies and beetles. But of this, in truth, especially as concerns butterflies and moths, we have little left to say. For the few individual descriptions we have found space to afford them we must refer our readers to preceding pages and pictures ; and as a general observation on their mode of decoration, we have noticed, we believe, that the painting on the wings of Lepidoptera is executed in mosaic, the scales or plumelets of which it is composed being laid upon, or, more properly, inserted through, minute holes in the transparent membrane of the pinion. No niggard of her colours, Nature on these overspreads both sides of her delicate canvas. Some, indeed, among our butterflies are able to display on the reverse of their glorious pinions, as they " ope and close them," a greater show of pattern than that which adorns their upper surface. Of this description are the standards of the " Red Admiral," 1 for in these we hardly can decide which are the most " admirable/' the rich and glowing masses of the upper, or the varied and elegant shadings and pencillings of the lower side : the same may be observed of the robes of the " Painted Lady" 2 and their linings. In many also of our genus Poly- ommatus, the cerulean blue opened in expansion towards the sky it emulates is hardly more beautiful than that warmer grey beset with mimic eyes, seeming, when the wing is erected, to look on the lowlier things of earth. But we must have done with enamelled and metallic painting, or where shall we find space to notice, finally, another species of decoration, which confers on certain among insect forms an apparent relation yet closer with the mineral kingdom, that semblance, we mean, of gilding, which they not unfrequently 1 Vanessa Atalanta ; also " Admirable." 8 Cynthia Cardui. See Vignette. INSECT GILDING. 385 exhibit in common only, we believe, with some of the most highly decorated of fishes l and of serpents ? 2 From its appearing most frequently on the enclosing cases of butterflies when in their pupa forms, these have obtained, with the pupae of moths also, the name of Chrysalides and Aureliae. This gilding is easily to be observed in August among the chrysalides of the small tortoiseshell butterfly (Vanessa Urticce), which are often to be found suspended, head down- wards, on the nettle-stalks they have stripped, or on some con- venient wall or pale adjacent. 3 The aurelia of the " Painted Lady" 4 is another which well deserves its name for the gold- like streaks and speckles which variegate its clouded surface. 1 As the Gold and Silver, the John-Dorey, the Gilt-head, the Scomber entrains, &C. 2 As the Coluber Atratulla, resplendent in scales of burnished gold, &c. 3 See Vignette. * Cynthia Cardui. ;]1ou 5 5 ante our trump tr itauBturj! rl ui ' The two spiders en the top of the wall are of the tribe called " Hunters," as opposed to " Sedentaries," or such as construct snares and sit within or beside them. That on the right, with zebra-like stripes, is the Salticus scenicus ; opposite, is a nearly resembling species; and climbing the Wall-flower, is a beautifully-coloured geometric Web-Weaver. SPIDERS IN THEIR ANALOGIES WITH OTHER ORDERS OF CREATION. E have had occasion to notice already a variety of correspondencies observable between in- sects and the higher, or larger, orders of animated creation. In the gentle, as well as predaceous tribes, this resemblance is trace- able ; but with reference especially to habits of destructiveness, the Spider alone, in its different species, affords the most striking parallel and prototype of all destructive beings, from man him- SPIDERS AND MEN. 387 self (we might even say, from the infernal spirit) through the descending grades of quadruped, bird, reptile, animal, flower, even to the vegetable of fly-catching construction. Hidden from view behind the gauzy screen afforded by her horizontal net, how does the domestic spinner sit grimly on her cunning watch for the least vibration in her lines, those single threads so art- fully extended above the main web for a triple purpose to arrest the flight of her victims, by its tremblings to announce their capture, and as a cable-bridge to enable her to reach and seize her prey. Besides thus with crafty wiliness seeming to plan and cer- tainly compassing the destruction of others, the spider, by apparent stratagem, often assumes the appearance of death as a means for the preservation of her own life. Who has not often noticed how that, on alarm or pressing emergency, she will sometimes, instead of taking at once to her hairy shanks, only fold them up under her, and, dropping from her station, remain without motion, even (according to experimental natu- ralists) to the piercing and tearing asunder of her soft bloated body? Again, it has been said and sung, that even the wild beasts spare their kind, the destroyer Man alone turning " his fierce pursuit on man." This is not true, the assertion being contra- dicted by several carnivorous creatures, both of land and water; but the spider follows pre-eminently in the path of the principal and earliest fratricide, by the habit of killing, and, in cannibal- fashion, devouring its comrades, even of the same family. Reaumur attempted to establish a factory of the large garden spiders, for the sake of their strong and beautiful silk ; but the factious weavers overturned his " projet" by turning their fangs upon each other. If it were an agreeable object of discovery, we might seek and find yet a few more corresponding points of character betwixt ourselves and the " villain spider ;" and what is singular, such resembling features are the most apparent in those species of the race which are greatest frequenters of p P 388 SPIDERS AND WILD BEASTS. the human habitation and its neighbourhood, in those which " Spread their nets, whether they be In poet's tower, cellar, barn, or tree," and which, comprising the spinners of house and garden, are of a class called Sedentaries, in distinction to the " Vagrants" and " Hunters" which, using no net, either lie in ambuscade, or roam about, seeking what they may devour. Now, as the " Sedentaries " are best representatives of preying men, so these latter, the " Vagrants " and the " Hunters/' are the nearer prototypes of preying beasts. And first, the " Va- grants," cunning also in their cruelty, bear, perhaps, greatest resemblance to the feline races, springing, like the tiger from his lair, upon their unsuspecting prey. Of these, one 1 forms or finds its ambush in a rolled-up leaf; another 2 lurks behind a stone or the gaping bark of an old tree ; a third 3 (as a tiger in his jungle) sits embowered in the thick panicle of a reed ; while a fourth, ensconced, as at bottom of a pit, in the calyx of a dead flower, sits prepared to pounce upon the first unwary fly happening to visit it in search of honey. If the more wary roamers of the forest and the desert have thus their insect images amongst spider " Vagrants" the more daring have resemblances as apt in the bolder "Hunters" such as spring openly on their prey, and, after destroying, carry it for devourment to their dens. On a flowering shrub sits an enormous hairy-leg of this description, on the look-out, we may be sure, for game : perhaps a swollen blue-bottle, a fat drone bee, or an overgrown crane-fly ? No ; he aims, or we may almost say he flies, at a higher quarry at a living prey, lustrous as a gem, swift as the lightning; as it darts from flower to flower, too rapid on the wing for human sight to follow, yet not so rapid as to elude the eight-eyed vision of the monster which has marked it for destruction not so rapid as to out- strip his eight-legged spring, or to escape the eight terrible 1 Clubiona holosericeum. C. atrox. 3 Aranea arundinacea. HUNTING SPIDERS. 389 claws which will soon engrasp the feathered honey-sipper, and bear it from its sunny joys to be devoured in a den of darkness. The " Hunter" here is the gigantic " Bird Spider" 1 of South America ; its prey, which it equals in dimensions, one of the glittering, quick-winged humming-birds which often, it is said, fall victims to this insect enemy, for bulk and fierceness the lion of its tribe. Compared with the above, our little native tiger of the same race 2 may seem a tame and insignificant destroyer ; but not so, we warrant, to its insect prey. This is of that pretty, common species, banded, like the zebra, with stripes of black and white. Everybody must have seen them upon sunny walls, and win- dow-seats, and palings (their scorching deserts) from spring to autumn, though not many, perhaps, have derived as much " divertissement " as the " Sylvan " Evelyn from observation of the cunning dexterity with which they watch, then leap upon their prey ; when he noticed of these, or of some allied vena- tores, how that one of them, if it " happened not to be within a competent leap, would move so softly as the very shadow of the gnomon seemed not to be more imperceptible, unless the fly moved, and then would the spider move also in the same proportion, keeping that just time with her motion, as if the same soul had animated both those little bodies." 3 These " Hunters," at least some of them, though they do not weave snares, can weave nests, usually a close tissue, within crannies and crevices, their common lurking-places. The Wolf Spider 4 is another of the " Hunters," which, seizing its prey openly, bears it to its den, a cavity beneath a stone. This carnivorous prowler, which is of a dark greenish-grey, haunts the borders of ponds and streams, and, as well as diving under, can walk on the surface of, the water; and another 5 1 Mygale avicularia. * Salticus scenicus. See Vignette. 3 Evelyn's " Travels in India." 4 Lycosa saccata. 5 L. piratica. 390 SPIDERS AND PLANTS. can perform the same feat, either to escape enemies or to pursue game, the various winged insects which skim the face of the same liquid mirror. The power of fasting for long intervals between their san- guinary repasts, is another characteristic held by many of the larger predatory animals in common with the spider. One of the latter, kept by Vaillant for ten months under a sealed glass, was found reduced only in size, and not, seemingly, in health or activity. To the devouring and amphibious reptile and the rapacious fish, the spider race no less offers its analogies in economy and disposition. Breathing by means of gills, they are able to dive, and walk under water, sometimes hunting on shore and plunging with their prey to the bottom. In the Diving Spider, 1 from whose singular habitudes we have spun elsewhere an imaginary tissue, 2 this faculty of respiration is further aided by that of carrying down a supply of atmospheric air to her sub- aqueous habitation. Lastly, the analogy between the fly-catching spider and the fly- catching vegetable is by no means so remote as may appear. It is an opinion generally received, that the latter, such as the catch-fly, the Venus's fly-trap, and the pitcher-plant, appro- priate to their own nourishment, if not the very juices of the insects they entrap, the air at least evolved from them in the process of putrefaction ; and, this admitted, the imprisoning vegetable, and the imprisoning animal, the one subsisting wholly, the other partially on the juices of their victims, must be allowed to be tolerable representatives of each other. But we have dwelt, perhaps, over long on those exceedingly ugly features of resemblance by which the spider is marked out so clearly as a member of that cunning, ferocious, flesh- eating family of which we constitute the head. Let us turn now to the brighter side of the Aranea portraiture, for a 1 Argyronefa aqimtica. 2 See " Fresh-Water Svren ; " also " A New Gallery of Practical Science." PERSEVERANCE OF THE SPIDER. 391 brighter side belongs to it. Against spider vices we have a set-off of virtues. Foremost among them stands maternal tenderness, or its very image, shown in the devoted care evinced by weaving mothers of the " treasure" they " tie up" so care- fully in " silken bags ;" and not alone do they care for it while thus enveloped in the shape of little senseless eggs, but when from each egg has issued fortn a little sentient spinner. Perseverance is another admirable trait for which the spider is eminently conspicuous. No one can deny it ; no one who has ever watched a garden spider in the construction or the reparation of her geometric web, who has noticed her doubling and redoubling the lines by which her fabric is to hang sus- pended, testing repeatedly their power of support by suspension from them of her own weight as she drops herself, now here, now there, from different portions of the thread. See her in construction of her woven wheel, measuring carefully by her provided ruler one of her own legs each spoke or radius, and each circular mesh which interlaces them ; and behold, finally, after all is completed, so neat, and trim, and regular, how that when her cords are sundered by the struggles of some powerful captive may be, by a Samson blue-bottle she will set to work again so cleverly, so patiently, to repair her broken snare. In the death of the darker superstitions which used once to attach to spiders, the remnant of one more cheerful still sur- vives in the name of the " money-spinner," and the toleration, even complacency, wherewith, in comparison with the rest of her sisterhood, this little visitant is still regarded; and truly this shadow of a fancy would be worth the keeping if people would but invest it with the substantiality of a moral such as the " worthy " Fuller thus sets forth : " When a spider," says he, "is found upon our clothes we used. to say 'some money is coming towards us.' The moral is this. Such who imitate the industrie of that contemptible creature, ' which taketh hold with her bunds, and is in king's palaces,' may, by God's 392 TEACHINGS OF THE SPIDER. blessing, weave themselves into wealth and procure a plentiful estate." But while the idle out of mischief may take a lesson of reproof, the wavering or the idle, out of faint-heartedness, may derive one of encouragement from the perseverance of the " money-spinning " family. We have all read how that the royal hero Bruce, when fleeing before his foes a hunted wan- derer, took, as an omen and an oracle, the labours of a spider, making his own decision for a last and final venture dependent, with the fate of Scotland, on the success or failure of its seventh effort for attachment of its line. How often has what is called our destiny, be we as individuals great or humble, seemed sus- pended on a thread as slender, a thread we are too apt to look on as a Parcas's line, the work of, and liable to be cut in two by, a capricious power out of and independent of ourselves. But not only have hope and courage been infused into the heart through the instrumentality of an insect weaver, but when no human shape of charity could approach to cheer it, the de- solation of a solitary prison has more than once found assuage- ment in the welcome companionship even of a spider. Who has not read of M. Pelisson, the hapless inmate of the Bastille, who, taming his little comrade, taught it to come for food at the sound of his flute ; and of that other Frenchman, Quatre Mere Disjonval, who,- during an imprisonment in which spiders were his sole companions, beguiled the weary hours by watching their movements and proceedings as connected with atmospheric changes, the observations thus made forming materials for a work published in 1797, on Arachnology, or the art of interpre- ting weather from the webs and motions of the spider race ; while in times more recent, " una bella ragna" on his dungeon wall, became the pet of Silvio Pellico. To return to the virtues of Arachne, we shall close our list of her recommendable qualities by that of cleanliness, wherein she rivals even her direst enemy of the broom, even the worthiest descendant of such assiduous maidens as were wont, CLEANLINESS OF THE SPIDER. 393 in the days of Faery, to receive ever and anon a silver recom- pense in the shape of " a sixpence in their shoe." As such a maiden with her carpet and her curtains, for ever sweeping and shaking, and thereto adding the personal propriety of never failing to " clean herself" when her work is over, so does the domestic spinner with her web, shaking it and dusting it, then smoothing down her person, and combing her hairy legs, till no unseemly particle is left to disfigure her attire or abode. In addition to perseverance and neatness, the spider num- bers, as we have seen, amongst her more pleasing attributes a large amount of ingenuity ; but we do not enlarge here either on its mode of exercise or the works of constructive skill by which it is exemplified, these having formed subjects more or less direct of former essays. We have only done our best to rescue the hairy-legged spinner from unmerited dislike. 'V On the canal in front are several insects and objects of insect fabrication, such as might have been suggestive to man of the Art of Navigation. Nearest, on the right, rowing itself down the current, is a Boat-fly ; on a line with it, to the left, the egg-boat of a common Gnat ; and betwixt them, the raft of a raft-making Spider, bearing its constructor. Closer to the rail appears the diving-bell of the Diving Water- Spider. The case at the back is occupied by various specimens of insect skill, and a few of the tools employed in their con- struction. On the lowest shelf, to the right, is the nest of the Mason Bee, with its hole of entrance ; cells, the work of a similar insect, appearing in the mortar of two detached pieces of wall placed behind it. Next to these, in the compart- ment adjoining, is a fragment of sand-stone, in which are several nests of Mason Wasps, with the leaning or curved towers raised over them in process of excavation. Beside these, is a piece of wood tunnelled, for her nurseries, by a Violet Carpenter Bee, each divided into cells by partitions of cemented sawdust, and stored with heaps of pollen. The perforations in the wood are openings to passages which communicate with the cells. Next in order, is another specimen of the same; and nearer to the left is the nest of another Bee Carpenter, also tunnelled in a piece of wood, but divided by partitions of clay, instead of saw- dust. The first object to the right, on the shelf above, is the cell, as constructed in earth, of an Earth- Mason Caterpillar. It is open, to show the interior, which is smooth, arid lined with silk for the comfort of the chrysalis which lies within. Vext, on a piece of wood, and composed of detached fragments of the OUR POLYTECHNIC. 305 same material, is the cocoon or cell of a caterpillar of the Puss Moth. The next is that of a Goat Moth the winter abode of its long-lived larva in the heart of a tree ; a portion of the wood wherein it is embedded, being cut away, shows its fabric, a cloth-like substance of mingled silk and raspings of wood. On the upper shelf of all are three tools, used by insect artificers. To the left are the powerful toothed jaws, constituting chisel, plane, and forceps of a Mason Wasp. Next, in the centre, is the compound tool, consisting of an auger and a pair of files, used by the Tree-hopper, to make grooves in branches for the reception of her eggs ; and to the right, is a portion of the saw used by Saw- flies for a similar purpose. A NEW GALLERY OF PRACTICAL SCIENCE. ADIES and Gentlemen of a mechanic turn, we can introduce you to a new theatre of ex- hibition, where ingenious mechanisms, arts, and manufactures are in daily operation. There, without payment of a shilling, you may look upon diving-bells and balloons see bodies pro- pelled through water by the strokes of an internal piston examine the models of a life-boat and a raft observe the effect of cleverly-constructed buoys behold in practice, or in their finished productions, the crafts of masonry, carpentry, spin- ning, weaving, and paper-making see the operations of and the implements for boring and tunnelling, the exercises of rowing and diving, with various other clever and curious per- formances, of which the Polytechnic can do no more, and in many instances does less, than display the parallels. Should you even be of the number who frequent the above-named gallery for its music rather than its mechanisms, for its pictures rather than its philosophy, our theatre lacks not something to suit your humour. The use of that most simple yet most powerful of instru- ments, the wedge, could have been suggested by an operation commonly performed by every species of bee ; yet he who first hit upon this wonder-working implement would have no doubt 396 MODELS OF BOATS. laughed incredulously on being told that he was using the same sort of agency to rend, perhaps an oak, as that employed by a bee beside him to effect its entrance or egress through the closed door of a blossom of a toad-flax or snapdragon. The insect, in accomplishment of this purpose, rests on the lower lip of the flower, insinuates its tongue between the upper lip and the valve, and then thrusting in its head, acts with it as a wedge to force the shut edges asunder. 1 Let us begin by a survey of what we shall denominate our hall. Around it flows an artificial canal, on the surface of which, stationary or in movement, we see a variety of what look, at a little distance, like diminutive model boats. These living boats, of which the like may be seen gliding in summer on the surface of every pond, are, in short, none other than boat-flies ; and most appropriately are they thus named. See, as they strike out regularly with their oar-shaped feet, how they cut through the liquid element, with their keel-like backs, their flat stomachs raised uppermost to form a deck, their broad, beaked heads the prow, their pointed extremities the stern. 2 But of what is this tiny boat composed ? and who the builder ? In lieu of horizontal planks, its sides, as we lift it from the water, show an array of pyramidal bodies, small end uppermost and compacted close together. These are the eggs of the gnat. Well, here, beside the edge of our canal, moored to an aquatic plant by some silken cables, we perceive, submerged all but the top, a bell or dome not very dissimilar in size and shape to the half of a pigeon's egg. Like that, and like a diving-bell, it is open at the bottom. To give you on this point entire satisfaction, we will raise from the water and reverse our diver's habitation, even at the risk of disturbing its occupant, who has been also, we must tell you, its ingenious constructor. There, the bell is uplifted, and we see him sitting within it, head downwards a somewhat strange position ; but it seems we have fairly routed him. He 1 See " Insect Miscellanies." 2 See Vignette. MASONIC WORKERS. 397 falls ! falls, though, upon eight legs, and makes off at full speed, no matter whither. Our business is with his vacated abode, a dome woven, as we now see, of close-spun silk, open, as we said, at bottom, impervious at top, with no orifice for entrance of water or of air. 1 But we must leave, for the present, these aquatic mechanisms, though as yet but half examined, that we may bestow a little of our notice upon a few other assembled specimens. Here is one insect, a sharp, waspish little animal, busied up to her eyes and ears in our own material for building, brick. Chipping away her hardest with a trenchant tool, she is employed in the work of excavation. To do her justice, we cannot but admit that she never leaves off; yet, for all her assiduity, her progress is but slow, for as, piece by piece, each about the size of a mustard- seed, she scoops into her hard material, she carries off each particle to some distance from the scene of operation. We may take a look now at the more rapid proceedings of another independent labourer, and in appearance and attire not unlike the last. Like her, she also is an excavator, but she is something more, more of an erector. She is employed upon a block of hard sandstone. Each few grains of sand that she thus detaches we see her kneading into a little pellet, and with the like moulded masses (her unbaked bricks) she has built already a circular wall or rampart round the edge of her exca- vation. Thus proceeding, as her pit deepens her tower rises, and will rise still, to the height, perhaps, of two or three inches. Ask you now the purpose of these arts in their miniature exercise, and the name of their tiny exercisers ? The latter, whom perhaps from their exterior you may have known already, are wasps, " mason " wasps, 2 mother wasps, and they are scooping their caves, and raising their towers, to provide secure asylums for their young. Contiguous to the above we see some completed specimens of masonry of a somewhat different construction, the work of 1 See Vignette. 2 Odynerus. Q Q 898 APIAN MASONRY. another yet allied class of builders. Here is a dome-shaped tenement, composed apparently of mud or clay. Within it we discover two separate cells or chambers " of the form and size of a lady's thimble, finely polished, and of the colour of plaster of Paris." This material is not clay, but apparently the mortar of the wall on which, as we have said, the whole structure was originally placed. The cells, with their outwork of conceal- ment, were once the nurseries of young bees of a solitary species, 1 and their mother, one of the "masons" of her tribe, was the clever architect and patient builder of the entire edifice. Now let us look at some specimens of insect travelling. Here is a nest of a carpenter wasp." It is wrought in a piece of wood, somewhat softened by decay, part, probably, of a post or pale. The tunnel, which is more square than round, is smooth within, chiselled as if by the tool of a veritable carpenter, and divided into as many as six separate cells or compartments, of which the partitions are no thicker than a card, and formed, not of sawdust (that having been carefully removed), but of kneaded clay, fetched as laboriously by the little builder, who herein shows herself an adept in masonry as well as in her own peculiar art. Within these cells, or some of them, is a portion of pollen, with which the bee-mother supplies her brood. We are handling now what may be looked upon as a perfect chef-d'oeuvre in insect joinery. It is the nest of a third apian carpenter, called, from the beautiful colour of her wings, the violet bee. 3 She is not, indeed, a recognized native of our own island ; but we can, nevertheless, in this her workmanship, admire and do justice to her constructive skill. The material, wood, as in the former specimens, is, in this, perforated by several tunnels cut for about an inch obliquely, then in a perpendicular direction. Each of these tunnels is 1 Anthophora retusa. 2 Of the genus Eumenes. 3 Xylocopa violacea. EXCAVATED ARCHITECTURE. 399 about a foot deep by half an inch wide, and divided in its length into separate cells about an inch in depth. 1 Who has not heard or read of the rock-hewn temples of the East ? of the far-famed cave of Elephanta, that masterpiece of excavated architecture, with its pillars and pilasters, its statues, its relievos of gigantic bulk, cut, all, out of the living stone (when, who knows ?) by that dwarf in comparison to these his works, that ephemera in comparison with their duration, Man ? But there are insects of another sort who have been working in ages as remote, and who work still, at excavated structures, which, as measured with their own statures, are more gigantic by a thousandfold than the sculptured Elephanta or the erected Edfou. These also are " carpenters " carpenter ants, their craft headed by the jetty emmet. 2 Their entire structures are, of course, too bulky for transportation to this our museum gallery; but here, in some several fragments, we may look upon their " walls, their galleries separated by partitions with oval apertures or door-ways, their pillars, arches, columns, and arcades ;" all wrought with wondrous lightness and delicacy, and all dyed of a dark, bordering on a blackish hue, how pro- duced would seem uncertain, but peculiar to the excavations of these jet-black labourers not the only ones which cut their sculptured cities in the trunks of trees. But these "carpenters" must no longer detain us, or we shall want time to bestow a glance, even, upon their brother '* Weavers." Upon the process of their manufacture we hardly can, though many are here assembled and busy at their work. - We may look, however, at a few collected specimens of their clever spinning, as exhibited in a variety of cocoons, from the looms chiefly of "Moths as Operatives" in their caterpillar estate. Here we have them from a veil of delicate net-work to a covering thick and warm as cloth. 1 See Vignette, and refer to description. 3 Formica fuliginosa. 400 INSECT MANUFACTURES. Some (as those of the silk-worm) are of pure silk, mingled in others, in various proportions, with baser materials, such as hairs from the weaver's own body, particles of wood, bark, or earth ; while a few are distinguished by partaking largely of animal secretions, widely different from silk, such as (in the lacquey) a powder resembling brimstone, and (in the oak-egger) a calcareous substance not dissimilar to the crust of an egg. This cocoon of the Hawthorn Saw-fly, 1 exposed with its occu- pant all through the winter upon leafless hedges, is composed of a material tough as leather, but much harder (also an animal secretion). Here is an empty one with a curious lid set open as for the exit of the perfect fly, which, furnished with an adapted tool for the cutting of this singular trap-door, never fails in its circular excision to leave entire just such a portion as serves for an attachment and a hinge. With a look at one other fabric, we must take leave for the present of insect manufactures. This greyish-white substance is paper, a paper strong, smooth, and durable, such as, if in sheets of size sufficient, we might even now be writing on. It is composed of vegetable fibres, reduced to a pulp, united by size or glue, and spread out into thin leaf. It is wrought by an artificer, who adopts a process precisely similar to that employed by those among us of the same occupation, only with more invariable success and skill. What may be the name of this clever paper-maker ? This specimen of work nearly discloses it. It is an aggregated col- lection of hexagonal cells, in all but material resembling a honeycomb ; and a comb it is, a portion of one taken from the nest of a common wasp. Now let us examine a few insect tools. Wonderful alike for its simplicity and the manifold uses which it is made to serve, here is the double pickaxe, each blade toothed on the inner edge, acting thus all the better as a fast-holding pair of forceps, 1 Tenthredo. OPERATIVE TOOLS. 401 as well as a cutting chisel. This, the compound tool, only slightly varied with different possessors, is the only tool of the "wasp mason, carpenter, and paper-maker." A pair of wasp mandibles or jaws constitutes the instrument now before us. 1 A hard bony substance is the material of which this and nearly all insect tools are constructed. A saw is the implement which next presents itself, a tool much resembling, only more complicated than that of our own carpenters : we may call it rather a pair of saws, or a compound saw, when in use working simultaneously at one cut. The in- struments are so exceeding fine and delicate as to need sup- port, and we see accordingly, that their backs are set within a groove. The teeth, instead of being simple, are denticulated with others cut more finely, which confers on this tool the ad- ditional properties of a rasp or file. 1 What are its uses and by whom employed? Its purpose is to cut grooves in the branches of trees and shrubs for reception and protection of insect eggs; and the insect by whom the grooves are cut is a maternal saw-fly. Here is another tool of surpassing nicety, lodged in a closely- fitting sheath, from which, on slight pressure, it is seen pro- truding. It is large enough for partial examination even by the naked eye, and, when thus viewed, appears a spike of equal thickness, except at the point, where it is broader and angular, and on both sides indented with teeth. Now let us behold it in the microscope. The teeth, strong and sharp, are, we can see now, about twelve in number on either side, and diminish in size as they approach the point. But what else reveals our magnifier ? Why, it shows that the instrument which appeared simple to our naked sight is made up in reality of three distinct pieces, the two outer ones armed with teeth, and called 2 " files," the central one pointed like a lancet, and not denticulate. The side pieces can be moved backwards and forwards, while the middle one remains stationary. 1 1 See Vignette. 2 By Reaumur. 402 OPERATIVE TOOLS. The carpenter, or carpentress which owns it, is the female Tree-hopper, or Cicada, who thus cuts the branches, while her mate " bursts the very shrubs" by his shrilly music. Our next more simple instrument is an awl, or piercer, which issues from a sheath, in form of a curved needle. It is the piercing ovipositor of a Gall-fly, and, though a great deal longer than the insect's body, is, by a mechanical contrivance, nicely adapted to it. We have here another borer, or brad-awl, defended by a sheath, which opens lengthwise, like a pair of compasses. The awl itself is single, nearly three inches long, and terminates, not in a simple, but a serrated point. This is the instrument of that large common ichneumon, 1 which, for deposit of her eggs, pierces through the clay defences of a " mason " wasp's nest. Here, as seen in the microscope, is a small needle, a needle of human manufacture. Its point appears " above a quarter of an inch in breadth, not round nor flat, but irregular and un- equal ; and the surface, so smooth and bright to the naked eye, seems full of ruggedness, holes, and scratches, like that of a rough iron bar." 2 Beside this clumsy piece of workmanship is now introduced another, by an infinitely more skilful hand, which exhibits " a polish most amazingly beautiful, without the least flaw, blemish, or inequality, and ending in a point too fine to be visible." 3 This we might suppose to be our insect weapon a natural as contrasted with an artificial needle ; but no such thing ; it is not the weapon, only the weapon's sheath. This opens longi- tudinally ; and now we discover what it enclosed, viz. two darts, distinctly separate even to the base. We can see further, that these darts are each of them armed with ten saw-like teeth, such as occasion the instrument, sheath and all, to remain fre- quently within the substance wherein it may be plunged. In truth, this is a formidable-looking tool of torment ; but poison 1 Pimpla manifestator. * Hooke's " Micrographia." 3 Hooke. OFFENSIVE WEAPONS. 403 also comes in aid of its lacerating power, liquid poison, con- tained in an attached bag, from which, on pressure by a me- chanical contrivance, it is ejected into the wound at the moment of its infliction. This deadly weapon is a bee's sting. We are shown next the blood-drawing stiletto of a gnat. We inspect it with an unaided eye. It seems to us a needle, solid, pointed, fine as a hair. We see it in the microscope, and in lieu of a simple needle, we behold a compound of several pieces, some of which are barbed. These are the piercers, while the sheath which encloses them is the sucker, which completes the apparatus. 1 1 See Reaumur, Swammerdam, Burnieister, and " Insect Architecture." \'f dj u iTc n a c a IT Tl a f \ u n * ! The subject of this Vignette is the Parsonage House at Barham, Suffolk, of the late venerable and lamented Mr. Kirby, the distinguished author, in con- junction with Mr. Spence, of the well known "Introduction to Entomology," and of one of the " Bridgewater Treatises." The Wasp in the foreground, employed in cutting off the wings of a fly with a view to its more convenient transport, is illustrative of an anecdote given by Dr. Darwin, and quoted by Kirby, in his observations on two classes of insect activities those prompted solely by Instinct, and those guided by apparent Reason. TWO THINGS OF DIFFICULT DEFINITION. >ATURE is now daily locking up from obser- vation, although in no spirit of a miser, more and more of her vegetable treasure, and therewith is hidden from our view nearly all , of those insect myriads which filled the sum- mer air. This dearth comparatively of outward objects of in- terest inclines, or in a measure drives, us to seek for others of ANIMAL INSTINCTS. 405 a kind not palpable to sight ; and as the decline of life, with the failure of its active energies, affords greater leisure, and should excite increased desire to look within ourselves, so the decline of the year gives time, arid naturally leads us to inquire into the nature of those inward springs by which are set in motion all the outward activities which have formed, hitherto, the chief objects of our notice. By the animating principle of the insect world, we do not, of course, mean that of mere vitality, common alike to animal and plant, but that endowment of perceptive and apparently judging mind which directs the former in its various operations. Instinct shall we call it? Reason? or a combination of both? Perhaps the best definition of insect and other animal in- stincts is that given by Kirby, who considers them as " un- known faculties, implanted in their constitution by their Creator, by which, independent of instruction, observation, or experience, and without a knowledge of the end in view, they are impelled to the performance of certain actions tending to the well-being of the individual and preservation of the species." Through Instinct, that endowment which is usually as perfect in the insect's creeping infancy as in its soaring adolescence, all caterpillars are directed to find, or more properly to appro- priate, the food instinctively provided by the mother's instinct, while some, even before that provision is attacked or cared for, are bidden by the same imperative power to shape and clothe themselves with garments made generally out of the same material as that to be employed for food. Of this we have seen examples in the clothes-moth in its state of infancy, with others of the same tribe (Tineidce) which make to themselves cases, or moveable tents (whence they are called tent-makers), out of leaves, bark, and other substances. The weaving, most ingeniously, of variously-formed cocoons, more or less solid, according usually to the period of their occupation, the suspending themselves no less cleverly, and in 406 INSTINCTIVE ACTIONS. places of security, for the process of transformation, are per- formances no less admirable of the caterpillar crew ; and the instinct which directed them, dormant for awhile, with other faculties, in the chrysalis, wakes again in the winged insect. Thereby directed, the moth or butterfly, perhaps guided also by her taste and smell, repairs directly to the flowers whereon she loves most to take her pleasure ; and then, in opposition to those very senses, proceeds, at Instinct's bidding, to the flower- less shrub or vegetable, for deposit of her eggs on the leaves best suited to support her unthought-of progeny. With bees, ants, and other social insects, Instinct would not appear, as with the Lepidoptera, to spring from the egg in full maturity, not at least with the active and varied powers after- wards acquired. In bee grubhood, also in that of wasps and ants, the instincts of imbibing nourishment and of spinning their cocoons would seem the only ones in activity, the place of all others being supplied by that watchful assiduity, also in- stinctive, with which the labourers of the hive or ant-hill tend upon the young of their communities. But no sooner does the bee attain to maturity, than Instinct, in full development, like the form over which it is to bear rule, impels the wings untried, to carry their possessor by the shortest cut to the flowery fields of her earliest labour; then reconducts her to her straw-built home as unerringly as though she, the tyro gatherer, were the most veteran collector of the hive. But does reason shine alone for man of all the inhabitants of earth ? Men there are, not perhaps of those who best cultivate this most improveable possession, who would yet for themselves and kind claim its exclusive monopoly. Such as these must grudge of course to the gigantic elephant even the half-justice com- monly awarded him in the epithet of " half -reasoning" animal ; and looking on him merely as an enormous clock, of which the clumsy machinery is worked alone by instinct, what other can they do than regard as a tiny watch that insect miracle yclept an ant? None acquainted at all with the chronicles of ele- ACTS OF SEEMING REASON. 407 phantine performance, can be at a loss for facts, not isolated, entirely at variance with the idea of making of the elephant a mere monster machine ; and as for the ant, the following rela- tion, 1 with a thousand more, would read strangely of a mechanic agent : " I saw an ant pulling with his mouth a piece of wood. The rest were busy in their own way ; but when he came to an ascent, and the load became too much for him, three others came immediately behind, pushed it up to level ground, and then left him. The end he pulled was the smallest, and, as he drew it between two things, it stuck there. After several fruitless efforts, he went behind, pulled it back, and turned it round." Proceedings such as these accord certainly much more closely with the opinion of the enlightened and pious Sharon Turner (by whom the fact is quoted), that " the actions and habits of the insect world display the same kind of animal mind [allowed by the same writer to \>e judging mind] and feeling which birds and quadrupeds exhibit. If there be a difference, it is not to the disadvantage of insects, for ants, bees, and wasps, and espe- cially the smallest of these, ants, do things, and exercise sensi- bilities, and combine for purposes, and achieve ends, that bring them nearer to mankind than any other class of animated nature/' 2 We insect men may not relish, perhaps, or care to observe, this approximation towards ourselves, of men-like insects. We would rather, perhaps, make the most of the inferential argu- ment, that because insects proper have avowedly a very large share of instinct, they have therefore no reason at all. We might as well infer of ourselves, contrary to facts, that because we may have a large share of reason we are utterly devoid of instinct. The practice of ants to rear aphides for the future consump- 1 From the "Imperial Magazine." 2 " Sacred History of the World," vol. iii. R R 408 VARIATION OF INSTINCT. tion of the sweets they furnish, bears equally the character of instinctive prescience. Instinct can also on occasion vary as well as err ; often dis- playing, among insects, its capability of accommodating itself, like reason, to circumstances. This is continually exemplified in the case of caterpillars, which, when confined to a box, will employ bits of paper and other chance materials in lieu of the grains of wood or earth with which nature is accustomed to supply them. Another instinctive operation varied to meet exigence is instanced by Reaumur, in the proceedings of a little elm tent-maker, whose tent or case of leaf-skin having been cut open at the side, was sewn up by its little occupant, instead of being supplied by a new one, as unvarying instinct would have prompted. We have given, elsewhere, 1 Dr. Darwin's often-quoted anecdote of the wasp and the dead fly, whose wings, when found on trial to be obstructive of its convenient transport, the wasp alighted to cut off. Kirby remarks on this relation, " Could any process of ratiocination be more perfect ? Instinct might have taught it" (as we believe it usually does) " to cut off all the wings of all flies previously to flying ; but here it attempted to fly with the wings on, and was impeded by a cer- tain cause, discovered what that cause was, and alighted to remove it." Did not the discovery of this cause imply also memory, and a gain of knowledge from experience, by which alone the wasp could have been taught, or reminded, that the wings of the fly were the impediments to his flight have given him at least reason to suspect it from the greater facility with which he had transported bodies that were wingless ? A trick, asserted by Huber to be on occasion resorted to by humble-bees for the purpose of extracting honey from flowers that are deeply tubular, has been adduced as another striking instance of the capability of insects to profit by experience. These humming honey-suckers usually extract the nectar from 1 ' Defence of Wasps." INSECT COMMUNICATION. 409 the natural opening at top of the bean and other tubular flowers ; but when by the breadth of their shoulders forbidden entrance into this narrow passage, they drill a hole with their proboscis through the calyx right into the tube, and in this manner tap their luscious wine, while the less bulky Bacchanals of the same species quaff it in the ordinary way. It is not ours to boast ourselves of any talismanic gift, enabling us to "understand the steven" of parleying insects; but we never watch the busy workers of the ant-hill, coming and going, stopping as they encounter, and laying their heads together, without being pretty certain that they are saying to each other a something quite as full, perhaps, of informing or of friendly significance as the " Fine day," or the " How do you do?" which forms the usual salutation of meeting men. We may often, too, perceive an ardent little labourer of the same race toiling at a burden may be, a great dead blue- bottle may be, a fragment of wood five times bigger than herself. After repeated efforts, she finds her strength unequal to remove it, and then bethinks herself (for think she must) that two or three united forces, and several pairs of forceps, are better than one, and, acting on the thought, we see her approach another or perhaps a group of her comrades, conduct them to the spot where she left her load, and succeed by their assistance in its transport. On the borders of a path or roadway leading through High- gate wood towards Hornsey, were scattered several of the conical cities of the red or wood ants. These, in their comings and goings, were accustomed continually to cross the thorough- fare, in doing which many among them fell victims to the feet of the passers-by. The intelligence of the survivors extended not certainly to the length of making them take warning by the fate of their comrades; yet they seemed to observe and sympathize therein. We have repeatedly noticed them stop- ping, first one, then another, on discovering of a dead mutilated body, till a group of several is collected round it. Sometimes, 410 INSECT CAPABILITIES. after an apparent consultation, the individuals separated, leaving the remains where found; at others, singly or together they attempted and accomplished their removal. That with relation to each other, the instincts or the affec- tions of insects are not, then, as has been imagined, wholly selfish, that, however circumscribed their sphere, they yet move in a circle beyond the central point of sensual gratifica- tion or self-preservation, is scarcely, we think, a matter to be doubted ; but how far the mental principles of these little crea- tures, like those of the larger animals, can communicate with, or may in any degree be susceptible of, influences from the " master-mind" of man, is a question which most people would deride rather than attempt to answer or consider. From the story of M. Pelisson's spider, which always de- scended for the meal wherewith he was accustomed to provide it, on hearing the sound of his flute, we may not infer, perhaps, that spiders in general are gifted (as would appear with the seal) with a soul for music. That particular spider, as well as his race, had probably only a taste for flies ; but from the fact related, the inference is plainly deducible, that they are capable of receiving through their senses other impressions than those absolutely conducive to their support, and that they have in their minds a power of connection such as mere instinctive impulse neither requires nor exhibits. Supposing the insect, in common with all other animal minds, to possess this extent of capability, we shall not laugh at Reaumur's expression of "the tamed moth," which sipped syrup off his finger, or doubt the relation of an English natu- ralist, who tells us of the humming-bird hawks, which, when on wing at their flowery repast, flew away frightened by his presence, till, tamed by custom, they learned to continue un- alarmed the discussion of their delicate banquet. In speaking of animal natures in connection with our own, we cannot forbear extract of a few remarks bearing on the sub- ject, by an American writer who has broached some new and intelligent ideas on the development of mind : MAN'S RELATION TO ANIMALS. 411 " Everything which surrounds us is full of the utterance of one word completely expressive of its nature. This word is its name, for God even now (could we but see it) is creating all things, and giving a name to every work of his love, in its per- fect adaptation to that for which it is designed. But man has abused his power, and has become insensible to the real cha- racter of the brute creation, still more so to that of inanimate nature, because, in his selfishness, he is disposed to reduce them to slavery. " We find the animal world either in a state of savage wild- ness or enslaved submission. It is possible, that as the cha- racter of man is changed they may attain a midway condition removed from both. As the mind of man acknowledges its dependence on the Divine Mind, brutes may add to their in- stinct submission to human reason, preserving an unbroken chain from our Father in heaven to the most inanimate parts of creation. # # # Everything will seem to be conscious of its use, and every man will become conscious of the use of everything." But it is more in our province to illustrate than to argue. Let us show, in conclusion, how two poetic minds Christian men of different countries and differing creeds have thought and written on this our reconciling speculation. A canine favourite is the object whereon is made to hang with both poets their sentiment and belief; but allowing continued existence to the dog, we must not deny it (admitting the resemblance of their forms of mind) to the ant or to the bee. Thus, our Southey, on the death in old age, by drowning, of a faithful friend and companion of his youth : ' But fare thee well ! mine is no narrow creed, And He who gave thee being did not frame The mystery of life to be the sport Of merciless man ! There is another world For all that live and move a better one ! Where the proud bipeds, who would fain confine 412 LINES FROM LAMARTINE. Infinite Goodness to the little bounds Of their own charity, may envy thee." 1 And thus, in substance, though in words which do but sorry justice to the beautiful lines of the original " Episode," does no meaner man than Alphonse de Lamartine address his real or imaginary favourite : " My dog ! the difference between thee and me Knows only our Creator ; only He Can number the degrees in being's scale Between thy instinctive lamp, ne'er known to fail, And that less steady light of brighter ray, The soul which animates thy master's clay ; And he alone can tell by what fond tie, My look thy life my death, thy sign to die. Howe'er this be, the human heart bereaved, In thy affection owns a boon received, Nor e'er, fond creature, prostrate on the ground, Could my foot spurn thee or my accents wound ! No, never, never, my poor humble friend, Could I by act or word thy love offend ! Too much in thee I reverence that Power Which formed us both for our appointed hour; That hand which links, by a fraternal tie, The meanest of His creatures with the high. Oh, my poor Fido ! when thy speaking face, Upturned to mine, of words supplies the place ; When, sentry by my bed, the slightest moan That breaks my troubled sleep disturbs thy own ; When noting in my heavy eye the care That clouds my brow, thou seek'st its meaning there, And then, as if to chase that care away, My pendant hand dost gently gnaw in play ; When, as in some clear mirror, I descry My joys and griefs reflected in thine eye, When tokens such as these thy reason speak (Reason, which with thy love compared, is weak), I cannot, will not, deem thee a deceiving Illusive mockery of human feeling, Southey, 1796. LINES FROM LAMARTINE. 413 A body organised by fond caress Warmed into seeming tenderness, A mere automaton, on which our love Plays, as on puppets, when their wires we move. No ! when that feeling quits thy glazing eye, 'Twill live in some blest world beyond the sky. No, God will never quench his spark divine, Whether within some glorious orb it shine, Or lighten up the spaniel's tender gaze, Who leads his poor blind master through the maze Of this dark world ; and when that task is o'er, Sleeps on his humble grave, to wake no more." ! " Jocelyn," Episode par A. de Lamartine, tome ii. p. 155. Hi an one tff euffimt fa ffir fratrfonu at ft .srrrft' . \ A trio of common Cockroaches (Blatta Germanica), commonly misnamed Black Beetles, are the invaders of the kitchen here represented. THE SPIRITS OF HEARTH AND HOME. A CHRISTMAS STORY. EMORY ! painter of the past ! let us invoke thee ! Ah ! but thou art too busy : we want but a single subject, and now, with a few touches of thy magic pencil, thou hast brought before us pictures enough of persons and of scenes to furnish an entire gallery, pictures self-arranged, of which the clearest and the warmest-tinted are those most distant. First, there is a landscape, half rural, half marine, of a village near the Kentish coast, an old-fashioned quiet little village, with its heavy-headed chimneys appearing here and there amidst embowering elm-trees ; more distant, the square spireless PICTURES OF THE PAST. 415 tower of the ancient church ; and behind all, caught at intervals, the line of ocean, defined and dark, or mingled almost with the blue horizon. Towards the centre of this wood-cradled nest, there stands, in the foreground of our picture, an old quaint-looking residence, itself a cottage, but distinguished from the lesser and lowlier of the assemblage by its magnitude, its flight of steps ascending from the pathway to the garden gate, its surrounding shrubbery and flanking fir-trees, its trellised porch and arched doorway, its casemented bay-windows, and its clustered chimneys. Three other pictures (family and domestic portraits) we must take down, next, from our memory-furnished gallery. All are of dwellers in the cottage just described, the principal residence, and eke the vicarage, of the village of H . First, we have its reverend master, of build substantial and air unpretending as his abode, of middle age, middle stature, and mediocre features, a man altogether made up of middlings, except that he seems invested with a portion more than mid- dling of indolent good humour. Most easy vicar ! dearly did we love thee; but only in proportion to thy claims upon our young affections. Thou wert our kind uncle, and, much more, scarcely less a father unto us than to thine own only little daughter Lucy ; and thou wert, moreover, our tutor, our earliest instructor in much of varied knowledge, truly more varied than profound. Thyself an entomologist (albeit of no zealous stamp), 'twas thou first set us on our hobby, and for this alone we should revere and love thy memory. Two humbler personages hang, in their portraitures, beside our uncle, humble, yet withal of vast importance in his house- hold, which, for several years, had been without a mistress. One is the widower's housekeeper, the nurse of his little Lucy, and once his own, old Dolly Dolly Dove than whom no feathered parent of the dove-cot ever spread a wing more tenderly over her cherished nestlings. The other portrait is that which presents the figure of Dolly's 416 A FIRESIDE INTERIOR. fellow-servant, our uncle's butler, valet, amanuensis, and libra- rian, eke our writing-master (Lucy's and mine), the angular, bony, spindle-shanked, high-shouldered, hard-featured, hard- minded, if not exactly hard-hearted, Caleb Caligraph, who could never from his cradle have looked young, and could never to his grave have appeared absolutely old. Now, last of our pictures, comes an interior, a scene by fire- light within the cottage parsonage depicted in our first. Here is the large low kitchen, opening out of the large low hall, with its open rafters apt for the double duty of supporting superin- cumbent chambers and dependent hams ; its dresser of like solidity, only of more fair complexion, and displaying on its shelves a bright array of blue-edged platters and polished pewters, both shining in cold disdainful rivalry against the ruddy coppers underneath ; the whole illuminated by the glare of a Vesuvian mountain of wood-crowned coal, glowing at bottom, blazing at top, crackling and spluttering, rejoicing, as it would seem, within its ample range, that its culinary labours, for the day, are ended. Our interior is not entirely a picture of still life. Seated, one on a low stool, the other on a wooden chair beside the fire, are two children a little white-frocked girl of perhaps nine or ten, fair, and looking fragile as a flower, and a boy some three years older, and by his garb seeming, like herself, a visitor only to the kitchen. The girl is as at Christmas Christmas fifty years ago appeared our little cousin Lucy. At the period when the above scenes and persons were in- vested with reality and life, the 23rd of December used to be a red-letter day in our then short calendar. It was that on which our uncle was accustomed to entertain a party of old college friends ; and we and our cousin, our company superfluous in the parlour, were permitted to bestow it in the kitchen, there to take tea with Dolly Dove and Caleb. In the kitchen, then, behold us, by fireligat, Lucy and I, and a large white cat. CALEB GALIGRAPH. 4] 7 It was a tempestuous winter's evening : the sleety rain came every now and then pattering against the casement, and falling in hissing drops upon the thirsty flames ; and when the showers remitted of their battering violence, we only heard more plainly the howl of the east wind in the tops of the old fir-trees round the house, and the creaking of a rusty weathercock on an adjacent dove-cot, with the sharp gallop of a hurried horse upon the hard high road, followed by the angry bark of our house- dog Keeper; but of all these varied sounds, nearest and most distinct, and diverting speedily our attention from them all, was the chirp of a cricket from between the bricks of the glowing hearth. Presently there came a sound of foot-scraping at the kitchen back door, which opened and gave entrance to a gust of east wind, and to Caleb Caligraph, returned from seeing that the visitors' horses had been, like their masters, hospitably enter- tained. Having rid himself of hat, great-coat, and lantern, Caleb joined our company by deposit of his stiff ungainly figure in his own arm-chair, in which, by the way, he never seemed to take his ease ; not, however, till he had duly recognized our presence by two separate inclinations of his queer, incomplete-shaped head, inclinations of two-fold character, half, bows of respect to his master's daughter and master's nephew, half, nods of patronage to the children he had known from infancy, to whom he had imparted, or was imparting, of the art and mystery of penmanship and figures, and to whom, above all, he had given presents, the annual present, that is, at Christmas, on the exact anniversary we commemorate, of a king and queen of gilt gingerbread. When our party of four was finally arranged, Mr. Caleb in his arm-chair on one side of the fire, Mrs. Dove presiding over her tea-board opposite, we, their guests, in intermediate places by the table, my little cousin began to relate how we had seen the cricket, and to repeat, with a little of my prompting, a few. s s 418 A MONOGRAPH ON CRICKETS. couplets of a " Cricket Song." Dolly listened with grave at- tention, and when the rhymes were ended, " I can't say," said she, " that I ever heard a cricket sing as plain as that ; but there's no knowing, they're such wonderful creturs in their doings, lapping the milk as nateral as old Tom there, and eat- ing bread and butter as hearty as a Christian. Then to see how they run amongst the red-hot ashes with never a foot burnt or a whisker singed, just like, if I may say so, the three holy children in the book of Dan'el; and what's most unaccountable of all, and what makes me think above all that they must be of the natur of sperits or fairies, they comes and goes all of a sud- den, nobody can tell when or how." " Why, Dolly," said I, " they can burrow, you know, and creep through crannies; besides, they have large wings to carry them wherever they please." " Well, dear, if they have, they're not like a rale insect's, a fly's or a bee's, standing out plain and straight to be seen by everybody; besides I've never seen one a-flyingof the hundreds as used to come to this fire-place. But let'em come and go however they may, one thing is certain, good luck comes with 'em, and, whenever they go, turns tail at the same time. Crickets is certainly wonderful creturs, if not sperits, more like 'em than anything else that comes about us." Lucy looked round fearfully, and got closer to her nurse's elbow, as the latter brought thus to an emphatic termination her monographs on the families Achetidce and Blattidce. They were followed, also, by a sound, compound of groan, cough, and whistle, from the liny lips of Mr. Caligraph, succeeded by the sententious apothegm " Superstition is the daughter of Ignorance," uttered with a look of unmistakeable application to Mrs. Dove, who, dove as she was, seemed slightly ruffled. " I know," said she, " though I'm my father's own daughter, that I'm not so wise as some folks, but I think, Mr. Caligrub, you might be a little more perlite, now at Christmas time, and in the company of little Miss here, and Master." " Why," returned the butler, alias librarian, alias writing- THE ASSAULTED CRICKET. 419 master " respecting the young lady and young gentleman, I must take leave to observe that ' youth is apt at learning,' and that ahem ! ( to instil false notions is not good. ' Fairies are fabulous/ and so, in my opinion, are spirits too, I always set my face against them, always did ; and as to crickets and kitchen beetles, those mean hinsects, of, I should say, the genus Hachetidy and Blatty, to talk of their being fairies or spirits, why" Here the fire-side chirper, who for the last half-hour had been perfectly mute, burst forth with such shrilly loudness as nearly to overpower the low husky voice of the prosaic setter- down of Dolly's superstitions. Caleb gave a violent kick with his great splay foot against the side of the fire-place, over the very spot whence the insect's voice proceeded. Down fell some flakes of plaster, and away, over the heated hearth, towards its opposite side, scampered the assailed cricket. But his move- ments were not half fleet enough for the ruthless Caleb, who, deaf to our interceding exclamations, and regardless even of falling embers, seized the hapless runaway by one of his long leaping legs just as he had made good his retreat into a snug cranny between the bricks. Thus hard pressed and hard pulled, the cricket abandoned his leg, and leaving it, a trophy, in the hand of his persecutor, disappeared within his hard-won place of refuge. Lucy burst into tears ; I, to see her, doubled my fist, and actually dealt our writing-master a sound blow ; and as to Dolly, no words, no pencil can depict the change that came over her. She neither shed a tear nor would she have struck a blow, hardly felt, perhaps, either sorrow or anger, all else swallowed up in a sudden shuddering presentiment, fearfully anticipative of some coming calamity connected mysteriously with the violence just done to the cricket, the last cricket of her hearth, the last good genius of our home. Well, Mr. Caligraph was certainly sorry or compunctious 420 FORGIVENESS AND FOREBODING. for having maimed, perhaps killed, the cricket, and so shared in a measure the discomfiture he had brought upon us all. He gave us no more of his copy-book moralities, and as soon as tea had come to a premature end, he muttered something about something else he had to see to, and left the kitchen. After Lucy was in bed, Mrs. Dove redescended to the kitchen, and joined Caleb, to await the return home of the other servants, and the always tardy break-up of my uncle's social sederunt. She, poor soul ! had lost her appetite, but she laid on supper for the old man, and even took down his pipe and placed it by his side. Softened, perhaps, for once, by these unmerited attentions, the offending butler, now that we were no longer present to witness his humiliation, actually made up his mind to express something like contrition for the deed he had committed. After sundry uneasy contortions of limb and feature, the hard lines of his face assumed something of a de- precating turn. He drew his chair towards that of his vis-a- vis, and then, in a voice not unlike the scraze of its legs upon the brick floor, gave utterance, as if with infinite effort, to the undeniable assertion that " Forgiveness is gracious." Dolly, with a sorrowful but most forgiving smile, shook her head; " Ah, Caleb!" said she, "you were in a pet, and I suppose couldn't help it ; but sure as we are sitting here, some- thing amiss will come over this old house before another Christ- mas. Well, you may look as if you didn't believe it ; but we shall see." At the parsonage we were all in our different ways addicted to entomology ; following therein the example of its master. My uncle possessed a cabinet of entomological specimens, with a case full of entomological books, finely illustrated also, in the season, an insect menagerie, of which the collection and the feeding were chiefly mine. The care of the cabinet and the books, as coming within the province of librarian, fell to the share of Caleb, who having, in their camphoring and dusting, made himself acquainted, by halves, with a few scientific names COLD CHRISTMAS TIDINGS. 421 of orders, families, and species, believed himself, from the acqui sition of these scanty chips, to have become a deacon in ento- mologic craft. On the morrow after the disaster of the cricket, my cousin and I were again the guests of Mrs. Dove, but then in her own, the housekeeper's room, for my uncle spent the day. in bed, a custom of no rare occurrence on that which followed his annual academic commemoration. The next morning, however, being that of Christmas-day, we breakfasted, as usual, in the parlour, and received, each of us, a hearty kiss, and a blessing as hearty, appropriate to the season. In the same overflowing spirit he failed not to garnish both our plates with nicely apportioned slices of the spiced beef which always, at the festive season, reigned paramount over the ham and tongue of ordinary breakfasts. After having himself done ample justice to the ruddy round, he had just equalized its surface by a last shaving, Lucy, lately promoted to the office of tea-maker, was pouring out his third cup, when Caleb entered, and laid two letters on the table by his master. Of the two just arrived, one was a Christmas annual from my father, the vicar's bro- ther, a merchant in London, the other a stiff, business-looking letter with a large seal, which my uncle, after he had read aloud the contents of the first, proceeded to open. Though fifty years have passed since that morning, I seem to have now before me the countenance of its reader under the talismanic change wrought by that piece of paper. He seemed to gulp down a rising exclamation, but it was more than he could do to swallow with it the remainder of his breakfast. Presently he put the letter in his pocket, rose, and left the room, bidding Lucy prepare for church, but in a tone as altered as his looks. It was some time before the nature of that Christmas intel- ligence by which the vicar was so sensibly affected became apparent. For awhile there was no change within his house- hold, save in his own dull depressed demeanour, with a shade of sympathetic gloom discernible in the face of Mrs. Dove. 422 DOLLY IN DECADENCE. Then, as from a tree shaken by autumnal blasts, every redun- dancy was seen to falL from the. comfortable - establishment of the parsonage cottage. House and kitchen-maids, stable-lad, and gardener, were one by one dismissed ; the cows were driven to a fair; the pony became the property of a neighbour farmer. The supplies of old pensioners dwindled till they died. The kitchen range became of course proportionately contracted, the jack was rarely heard, and as for the cricket, that was never heard or seen at all never since that fatal evening; -he was departed dead, or, if of mould immortal, mortally offended. In a language of signs too significant to be mistaken was thus revealed the purport of that chilly greeting which had met my uncle upon Christmas morning ; the announcement, for it was none other, of his banker's total failure, involving the loss of his whole fortune, except the slender income derived from his very small, poor, and lowly-tithed parish. It may seem strange, but the boding impression made on Mrs. Dove by the wrong done to the favourite of her hearth did not appear so greatly deepened as might have been expected by the blow fallen already on her master's fortune. She was doubtless perfectly convinced that it had happened in accord- ance with her prophetic augury ; but perhaps she had expected worse, and was relieved, therefore, at supposing the doom ac- complished, and that ill luck or the offended cricket had done its worst. Then there was another cause why Dolly's spirits bore up so bravely. She was more busy than ever. Prodigious were her efforts to supply to her impoverished master the deficiencies which, but for them, he might have felt in his personal com- forts. His dinners were dressed with double care, more pro- fusely garnished, more punctually served. Not a stew-pan did she suffer to grow dull in absence of the kitchen-maid, nor a parlour to mourn in dust and cobwebs for the absence of the housemaid. She supplied the place of all ; yet every evening THE DAY OF DEPARTURE. -423 would see her in her cap and apron of unsullied whiteness, the same respectable concierge as in better days, ready by her trim exterior and cheerful aspect to baffle the speculations of all curious visitors, whether to kitchen or parlour, who might come to pry into their minister's altered fortunes. Though my poor uncle's affairs wore an irretrievable aspect, he had been urgently advised to pay a business visit to the me- tropolis by friends there resident. Amongst them was my father (his younger brother), who had sunk in mercantile adven- ture a younger brother's fortune, and was now, with the burden of at large motherless family, only toiling to acquire anotner. To his abode in the City my uncle had for above three months been promising to repair but in a procrastinating spirit, half- nervous, half-supine, he had from day to day deferred his jour- ney till the arrival of the second week in May, when he actually made up his mind to leave his home for the first time for many years. The morning came on which he was to take the coach from the neighbouring post-town. Its distance of ; three miles was beyond that of his usual walking, and he was glad, 'therefore, to accept for the occasion a loan of the pony once his own. Caleb was despatched beforehand to bring it back, and carry his master's portmanteau, with a basket of provision for the jour- ney, provided by Mistress Dove. About eight o'clock the traveller himself started. Dolly stood on the steps, looking after him with wistful gaze; Lucy and I (for a part of the way) bearing him company, she seated on the saddle before him, I walking by the side. The labourers returning from their work to breakfast looked inquisitive as they touched their hats, won- dering at the object of their pastor's early sortie. Few were the words, but they were very kind, which my uncle said to us, and fond were the looks fond and very sad with which he regarded us as we proceeded slowly along the beautiful winding road, which, after passing the church, ran - nearly parallel with the coast to the little sea-side town from 424 DARK FOREBODINGS. whence the stage started. Fond, as I have said, more earnestly fond than usual, were all his looks and words ; but of all, none were by me so well remembered as his parting injunction " Take care, Frank, of your little cousin." This was given at the foot of a hill between us and the town, up which he had forbidden our ascent, and just as I was helping Lucy from the saddle after he had given her his parting kiss. Then he kissed me too. " God bless you, my boy ! God bless you, my dear children !" and the pony, from habit, broke into a canter, and was presently half-way up the hill. I felt, at that moment an unaccountable chill strike to my young heart; but I was to "take care of my little cousin ;" and, seeing the tears streaming down her cheeks, I began the fulfilment of my charge, by trying to play the man, and do my best to console and to divert her. Week after week passed over, and brought from my uncle only an occasional short letter, of which those received latterly made no mention of return. Meantime, the purse which he had consigned to Dolly on departure waxed low and lower, while, in like proportion, the face of the faithful stewardess grew more and more anxious, till she was an entirely altered person, in all but devoted affection, testified, if possible, more than ever towards us, her children. One night, late in September, when we were assembled Lucy on a low stool, one hand on Dolly's knee, the other on the head of the large white cat her eyes, as those of us all, bent upon the fire, she suddenly whispered, " Look there ! there's the cricket !" and she pointed as she spoke towards the hole into which our old favourite had run for refuge on being routed by Caleb from his original retreat. "Look there!" she repeated; "I see his horns" and sure enough, by the flicker of the dull fire-light there appeared protruding from the cranny a long pair of waving antennae. Dolly, eager to be assured that it was the cricket's self, caught a candle from the mantel-shelf, lighted, and held it under the grate opposite the AN UNWELCOME VISITANT. 425 cavity. Its occupant was not dislodged, because probably it was afraid to advance, and had no retreating passage in its rear; so motionless it sat, staring at the light or its examiner, who screamed with at least equal terror on discovery of what it was. It was no cricket after all, but a dark brother of the same order one of those broad flat-bodied, night-loving, all- devouring, all-polluting, ill-scented creatures, the objects, as we have seen, of Mrs. Dove's especial hate and horror. " It's only a cockroach," said I. " Only ! dear," returned Dolly. " You may call it a cockroast ; but I knows it well ; 'tis a black beadle one of the very same I saw when I was a girl at Mortiplume's, and never since. There they came by hundreds, and that was bad enough ; but here, in this poor old house, it has come by one, and that's worse, for it's sure for certain to be the forerunner of a death, here, in the family, or not far off." " Nonsense, Dolly," said I ; " it's not come to foretell death, but to pick up its own living, the crumbs, perhaps, at our tea-time ; for it's as fond, every bit, of bread and butter as your own cricket ; but I'll read to you after tea all about it, and show you it's picture, or Lucy shall, in one of Uncle's books. I'll go and fetch it before it's quite dark." "Not to the libery ! not to-night!" cried Dolly; and she grasped me tightly by the arm. I wanted to go, but did not like opposing the good creature, whose fears of the haunted room were then, we knew, in the ascendant. While I hesitated, who should come to my relief but Caleb, who, bearing, perhaps, in mind his awkward part once in the drama of the cricket, had in this taken hitherto no part at all. " I'll go," said he. " I can inform you, Mrs. Dove, that Master Francis is perfectly correct ; that hanimal is a cock- roach order Coloptery, genius Blatty I'll get the volume 'seeing is believing'" and he rose to put his purpose in execution. "But won't it do in the morning?" said Dolly. " You'd better take the candle, at any rate." "Candle!" returned Mr. Caligraph, in his progress towards the door ; T T 426 A MYSTERIOUS CATASTROPHE. " moon's up full this morning nine o'clock, A. M., twenty minutes and, supposing it was dark, I can put my hand on e'er a one of the books in the bookcase. I should think so a man in my capacity Order is admirable." " Well, if go you will, go you must ; but I wouldn't to-night," repeated Dolly, entreatingly, as Caleb opened the kitchen door, and shut it resolutely behind him. Perhaps, however, when it was closed, a restraining some- thing, sprung of Dolly's deprecating words or looks, or of his own fireside musings, made Caleb linger on the threshold, for a minute at least elapsed before we heard his creaking step across the hall, up the stairs, and then along the dark narrow passage which led into my uncle's study, the door of which we then heard close after him. " He might have left it open, at any rate," said Mrs. Dove, with a look of fluttering wonder- ment. Then all were silent, and, in momentary expectation of Mr. Caligraph's return, minutes went on till they made up perhaps a quarter of an hour but no Caleb re-appeared. What on earth could he be about ? I would have gone to see, but an imploring look from Dolly kept me back, till, thump ! came the sound as of a heavy fall in the direction of the library. We all three started to our feet, and Dolly was the first to reach the kitchen door ; there, however, she hung back, and, holding Lucy back by the hand too, followed me, bearing the candle, up the stairs. The back-room door was shut, and something within ob- structed its opening. Open it we however did, wide enough to gain admittance, and then, on the floor behind, found ex- tended the prostrate length of Caleb. Dolly's fears took at the sight a new turn ; she held the candle with a trembling hand over the features of her old fellow-servant, fixed now in even more than usual rigidity ; but when by their scrutiny she had ascertained that nothing serious, in the way at least of bodily disorder, had overtaken him, she drew from that tra- velling dispensary, her ample pocket, some pungent restorer of AN APPARITION. 427 the wandering senses, and plied it assiduously till Caleb opened his ink-blot eyes, and, with recollection still at fault, recovered slowly sufficient of corporeal energy to rise from his recum- bency, and totter, supported by the arm of Mrs. Dove, to his dormitory and his bed. There we must leave him, and, taking a few steps backward, relate his experiences of that memorable evening, as in substance or in shadow they were imparted next morning in the weakness of recent terror to the eager but anticipative ear of Mrs. Dove. He had, as he declared, just entered the library, when the door, as if taken by a draught though wind there was none shut to behind him. The moon was shining brightly through the casement opposite, and threw a long black shadow on the floor from the high antique arm-chair, placed then with its back towards him, and fronting the library table, which stood not far from the cold empty fireplace. Caleb proceeded to- wards the bookcase, that division of it a little to the right of the chair, and just above it, which he knew so accurately to be the precise place of the desired volume. He stood under it his arm was raised towards it ; but another arm was stretched forth at the same time, and another hand, pale and shadowy, took down the book before he could lay hold of it. The apparition to which that hand belonged must have risen from the great arm- chair, whose back had screened it on his entrance ; and before Caleb had time, if he had dared, to look upon its features, was again reseated, back towards him, book open, at an illustrated page, whereon it was pointing with its thin white finger to the figure of a cockroach. Caleb had seen enough, and attempted, his few teeth chattering, and his knobby knees knocking, to effect his exit from the library ; had almost reached the door, when a cold arresting hand seemed laid upon his shoulder, and he fell, as we had found him, prostrate on the floor. "Master is dead," said Dolly, after hearing the above relation. "Master is dead; I know it;" and her supersti- tious awe giving way presently to heart-breaking sorrow, she burst into an agony of tears. 428 DECAY AND DESOLATION. If news of death were really on the road to us, as our Dove was now thoroughly persuaded, they travelled, like a hearse, slowly. Tidings none at all reached us of my uncle ; but howso- ever it might fare with him, his house seemed more than ever stricken with death-like symptoms of decay. In the garden the ordinary touches of autumn were invested, to me, with more gloomy hues than they had ever worn before. Frosts had been sharp and early, and the dahlias, as they hung black and drooping over the middle walk, seemed to mourn for the admiring master, who, in his own pride, had so often propped them up in theirs. But amidst these deepening tokens of decay, within doors and without, one was, to me at least, more perceptible, more heart-saddening than them all. Lucy, my little cousin, of whom I was to take care she, too, in her early spring-time, was overtaken by autumnal blight.' The cough the hectic flush the sparkling eye the childish beauty, wearing now almost unearthly bloom, now a faded pallor, which bespoke too plainly its true character, all these told me, though hardly would I believe their tale, that I should not long have my little cousin to take care of. One cheerless rainy afternoon in November we were all as usual in the kitchen ; Dolly seated by the dull fire, darning stockings ; Caleb, opposite, reading a religious tract ; I and Lucy standing by the window watching the heavy rain-drops and the light brown feathery leaves falling in a mingled shower from a deciduous cypress, which stood on the grass-plot opposite. Presently, there came a ring at the garden-gate a ring low and half-fearful, as if the bell were pulled by a timid or unwilling hand. Keeper barked loudly ; but it seemed to me as if there was more of recognition than of anger in his voice. We just saw the top of a hat a gentleman's hat above the close high gate. "It's papa!" cried Lucy " it must be papa !" Dolly's stocking fell from her hand ; but she sat still she couldn't, or she didn't dare to move. I said nothing ; but DEATH IN REALITY. 429 my heart beat violently when, after a short parley at the gate, I saw who it was that entered and approached the house. It was my father, and he had come to bring news of my uncle news that he was dead. His visit to London had been fruitless, excepting only of harass and fatigue. His banker's failure was complete, and he had been diappointed also of a small living, but of greater value than his own, which had lately fallen vacant, and of which the patron had given him a promise years ago when he did not want it. He was on his way homewards by the coach, when, as he was dismounting at an inn, where the stage stopped, he fell in a fit of apoplexy at the door. He survived only a few speechless hours ; but from papers found about him the people of the inn were enabled to write to his brother, who arrived in time to find him just expired. He had left no will had, indeed, excepting debts, little to bequeath. His remains were laid within the shadow of his own church, beside those of Lucy's mother ; after which my father staid at the parsonage but a few days, employed, as days after death usually are, in the cold curious business of prying into papers and personal effects of the departed, and in forming such new arrangements as death may make requisite for those left' behind. My father returned to business, leaving me and Caleb to follow after the latter had seen to the completion of some ar- rangements for the sale (for the benefit of his creditors) of my poor uncle's furniture and effects. His cabinet of insects and a few of the least costly of his books on entomology my father, at my request, contrived to save for me. During the week or two which Lucy and! passed together before the day of parting I noticed few comparatively of her threatening symptoms ; and she looked all childish bloom as well as beauty on that December morning. I saw her again on the Easter following the December that we parted, my first holiday from business, when my father allowed me to pay a few days' visit to Dolly's cottage. Did I return with renovated hopes or fears confirmed? per- 430 CERTAINTY AND HE POSE. haps with hope, for I applied myself to work more steadily than ever. On the same anniversary the cheerful spring-time of the following year on a Saturday, when the church was open ; two persons were seen loitering in it. They were an aged woman of comely figure and mild though then overclouded aspect, and a youth of about seventeen, and they repaired pre- sently from the aisle to the chancel, where they stood together, hand-in-hand, before a simple tablet let into the wall. The names of three individuals had been graven successively upon the marble, that of a mother, who had died young a father (late vicar of the parish) and a child, their only child Lucy, who had followed them at the age of fourteen. r- fainter of f fir f ur> in uu lie ff)f* CHISWICK PRESS : PRINTED BY WH1TTINGHAM AND WlLKINS, TOOKS COURT, CHANCERY LANE.