included, formerly ranked with the insect tribes. The "model" insect is an animal which, in its mature form, has a body separated into three distinct regions, six legs, two antennæ or feelers, and one or else two pairs of wings. Let the reader make prisoner for a time of the first fly that settles on his nose, and he will see that the gentleman corresponds to the description we have given. The common wasp, the cockchafer, or a butterfly, would answer the purpose equally well, and would also show how wide the range of variation may be while still adhering to the general typical form. It is only in their mature or perfect state, however, that insects exhibit these distinctive char- | acteristics, and before that mature form is reached, they have, for the most part, to undergo a more or less complete series of transformations. 66 a thoughtful person the feeling of wonder, and almost awe, to which the observation of the extraordinary changes which these creatures undergo gives rise. The interest of entomology as a study consists, to a great extent, in noting the endless variety of procedure among insects while preparing for, or actually undergoing, these transformations. The history of every individual insect, from the moment when the little caterpillar or grub makes its escape from the egg, through each subsequent incident and stage in its career, till it finally comes forth from the pupa, a winged denizen of air, is replete with interest to the curious observer, and could hardly fail to impress a devout mind with the sentiment of Bonnet: "It seems to me that I am at a spectacle where the Supreme Artist is hid behind the curtain." Much misapprehension prevails as to Nothing in the whole range of natural the precise character of these insect transhistory excites the wonder of the observer formations. And strangely enough, an more powerfully than these transforma- error which was not altogether unnatural, tions or metamorphoses of the insect tribes. when the general subject of the embryonic "If," say Kirby and Spence, in one of development of animals was less perfectly their most frequently quoted passages, understood than it is at present, is still naturalist were to announce to the world propagated by some of the leaders in enthe discovery of an animal which for the tomological science. The error to which first five years of its life existed in the we refer is thus stated by Kirby and form of a serpent; which then, penetrating Spence: "A caterpillar is not, in fact, a into the earth, and weaving a shroud of simple, but a compound animal, containing pure silk of the finest texture, contracted within it the germ of the future butterfly, itself within this covering into a body with- inclosed in what will be the case of the out external mouth or limbs, and resem- pupa, which is itself included in three or bling, more than anything else, an Egyp- four more skins, one over the other, that tian mummy; and which, lastly, after will successively cover the larva." Acremaining in this state, without food and cording to this notion, which is, or seems without motion, for three years longer, to be, indorsed by Mr. Douglas in his reshould at the end of that period burst its cent attractive little book, "The World of silken cerements, struggle through its Insects," and is supported by several great earthly covering, and start into day a names among the naturalists of former winged bird; what, think you, would be days, the metamorphosis of an insect is the sensation excited by this strange piece nothing more than a repeated casting off of intelligence ?" What, indeed ? of its external skin, the perfect insect exyet the supposed case differs but in mat-isting all the while, in its proper form, ters of detail from the actual history of by far the larger proportion of the members of the insect world. In some of the tribes the metamorphosis is only partial, and the insects which belong to them exhibit pretty much the same appearance, and lead an almost identical mode of life throughout the entire period of their existence. Among other tribes, the moths and butterflies especially, the reverse of this obtains, and no degree of familiarity with the subject is sufficient to destroy in the mind of a And beneath and within its different external wrappers. But surely, as Professor Rymer Jones remarks, it can be no more necessary to suppose the pre-existence of so many skins, in order to explain the moults of a caterpillar, and its subsequent changes to a chrysalis and a butterfly, than to imagine that we ourselves have several skins one beneath the other, because, when the cuticle is removed by the application of a blister, a new layer of epidermis is again and again renewed. The error arises from a mistaken idea, that the metamorphosis of the insect is something singular and exceptional in the animal world, combined with a misconception as to the true nature of the epidermic investment. The proper explanation of the phenomena appears to be this, that the successive changes which the insect undergoes are, in principle, the same as obtain among most other creatures in their early embryonic stages; and that the repeated moults and changes of form are due to the living skin or cutis beneath the external epidermis gradually developing itself, and expanding into variously shaped organs, in accordance, in every case, with the law of being, if we may so speak, of each individual species. The popular notion is, no doubt, by far the most attractive of the two; but, unfortunately, nature and truth do not always square with our ingenious fancies, which injure quite as often as they advance the cause of science. 66 Let us pass, however, from this somewhat dry and abstruse topic to the history of an insect familiar to all our readers, and which has long occupied the attention of naturalists. The aphides, or plant lice, the green fly" of the gardener, have as wonderful a history as any members of the insect tribes, and with a small expenditure of trouble our readers may trace the entire wonderful history for themselves. It appears that in autumn the swarms of aphides which infest our plants are composed of both male and female insects, which, after pairing, and the deposition of the eggs by the females for a fresh brood, speedily die. In the following spring, as soon as the sap begins to flow, the eggs, which survive all the rigors of winter, are hatched, and the young lice, beginning immediately to pump up sap from the tender leaves and shoots, rapidly increase in size, and soon come to maturity. In this state, it is found that the whole brood, without a single exception, consist of females, or, let us say, of individuals capable of reproducing their kind. In a short time these animals produce a second brood of females like themselves, which again give birth to a third brood of precisely the same description, and this process goes on throughout the summer without the appearance of a single male insect. In the autumn, however, insects of both sexes are again produced, and the females deposit eggs to continue the species in the same manner through the next summer. This extraordinary mode of reproduction has naturally excited great attention, | and several theories have been advanced to account for it. Reaumur endeavored to elude the difficulty altogether by asserting that aphides were androgynous; Leon Dufour referred the phenomena to spontaneous or equivocal generation; and Steenstrup, who gives the reproductive virgins the curious name of ammen, or wet nurses, treats the matter as an instance in support of his doctrine of the "alternation of generations." The latest authority on the subject is Dr. W. T. Burnett, who discusses the question, and gives the result of his own personal observations, in an important paper, first published in "Silliman's American Journal" for January, 1854; and the conclusion to which this gentleman comes is, that a modification of the view put forth by Steenstrup is probably the correct one. It is quite clear, however, that much has yet to be done before the matter can be regarded as settled, and any enterprising entomologist may, if he will, turn to good account the little vermin which batten on his geraniums and calceolarias, by still further following up the subject. In Closely connected, if not in some respects identical, with this anomalous mode of reproduction among the aphides, is the phenomenon which has been designated parthenogenesis, or reproduction by virgins, which are indisputably true females. Professor Siebold, of Berlin, has greatly added to our knowledge of the insect wonders of this kind by his essay "On a True Parthenogenesis in Moths and Bees," a work which has recently been given to the English public in a translation by Mr. Dallas, one of our ablest entomologists. this essay Professor Siebold announces the discovery of the remarkable fact, that a queen bee, which has never had her nuptial flight with a drone, will yet lay fertile eggs, such eggs, however, invariably producing drone bees alone. It is only after the nuptial flight that the queen bee is able to lay the eggs of either sex at pleasure. One chapter of the book is devoted to a record of cases in which virgin females of the silk-worm moth have been known to deposit fertile eggs; but the moths among which this mode of reproduction chiefly prevails, are a curious race of tiny crea 66 tures, whose caterpillars construct for organs of flight are neatly folded up when themselves movable cases of earth, or not on active service." Bees, wasps, stems of grass, in which they undergo ichneumon flies, and the like, have simple their transformations, and which also serve membraneous wings, and are therefore as dwelling-places for the wingless fe- the Hymenoptera; the dragon-fly with males, by which these moths are all dis- its gauzy wings, the frail ephemera, and tinguished. The males of these insects others of the kind, form the Neuroptera, or appear to be singularly disproportionate in nerve-winged order; and so on; the numnumber to the females, the collector some- ber, nature, or degree of development of times rearing hundreds of the larvæ without the organs of flight being the guide obtaining anything but the same invariable throughout for the arrangement of the wingless females; and it is probably de- mighty host of animated forms which consigned as in some sort a compensatory stitute what is fitly termed "the insect provision for the continuation of the race, world." that the females are endowed with this extraordinary power of virgin reproduction. Professor Siebold was struck by observing the violent impulse by which the female moths, very soon after their exclusion from the pupa, were impelled to deposit their eggs; but he continues, "If I had wondered at the zeal for oviposition in these husbandless Solenobia, how was I astonished when all the eggs of these females, of whose virgin state I was most positively convinced, gave birth to young caterpillars, which looked about with the greatest assiduity in search of materials for the manufacture of their little cases." It only remains for us to add, that, as in the instance of the "wet nurses" among the aphides, the female moths continue their reproductive power through several successive generations. In the classification of insects, the wings, which, as Professor Owen remarks, are "the grand and characteristic endowment" of the tribe, serve as the basis for their distribution into separate orders. It is not necessary here to go into the details of the classifications generally adopted, though it will not be out of place to mention briefly some of the more prominent divisions. The moths to which we have just been referring constitute, with the butterflies, the order Lepidoptera, or scalewinged insects; the so-called down or feathers with which the wings of these insects are clothed being nothing less than an almost infinite number of beautiful symmetrically formed scales attached to the membrane of the wing in regular rows, like the slates or tiles covering the roof of a house. "The sharp-bone beetle" and his allies form the Coleoptera, or sheathwinged order, the said "shards," in all their endless variety, being literally the sheaths or shields under which the real One of the few insects which do not readily fall into rank and file in the ordinary systems of classification is that little rogue, often very well known where his acquaintance is never acknowledged, the common flea. Pulex irritans is his name; and very irritating fellows they are generally allowed to be; though that genial old lady, mentioned by Kirby and Spence, who thought them "the prettiest little merry things in the world," appears to have regarded them with great favor. It has often occurred to us, by the way, that the old lady above mentioned must be the same that is referred to in another part of the "Introduction," who declared she could always hear when a flea walked over her nightcap, and that it clicked as it went along, as if walking on pattens! If there be any one insect more than another which deserves to be called the universal favorite, it is surely the honeybee. Little children sing about it in the nursery; it is an everlasting theme with those grown-up children the poets; and, as we have already seen, the philosophers find in it abundant scope for their profoundest study. It ranges at large over the New World as well as the Old; everywhere known, and everywhere an object of interest, and even affection. "A bee among the flowers in spring," says Paley, "is one of the cheerfulest objects that can be looked upon. Its life appears to be all enjoyment; so busy and so pleased." Next to the honey-bee, the best-known members of the tribe are doubtless the humble-bees. They are all social insects, and live in communities, consisting, as in the case of the honey-bee, of males, females, and workers, the number of individuals in each nest being small, however, in comparison with the teeming population of the hive, and never exceeding two or three hundred. The nests of these insects are, for the most part, constructed on the surface of the ground, in meadows, pastures, and open woods, the material employed being moss, when the builders can get it, and when not, any convenient material that comes to hand. Mr. Smith mentions a case in which a knowing "foggie-bee," being hard driven for material for her domicile, repaired to a stable, and gathering up little bundles of the short hair which had been curried from the horses, set about composing her nest entirely of horse-hair. In the case of some of the humble-bees, the nests are built under ground; and this difference in habit is marked, it seems, by a great difference in the spirit of the architects, for while the above-ground builders exhibit very little courage or pugnacity, the dwellers below defend their nests with much resolution. The solitary bees exhibit great diversity of taste in respect to the matter of housebuilding. In the pleasant pages of Kirby and Spence they stand arranged as clothierbees, carpenter-bees, mason-bees, upholsterer-bees, and leaf-cutting-bees; to which ample list of bee-tradesmen, Mr. Rennie, in his "Insect Architecture," very properly adds the mining-bees. These designations are of course somewhat fanciful, though there is sufficient foundation in fact to allow of their use; and there is this further resemblance between the human and the bee worker, that when one trade, from local circumstances, fails, or cannot be followed, the industrious insect can easily, as the industrious man, turn his hand to another the carpenter become mason, or the mason miner. In the situations chosen for the construction of the nest, and the manner in which the latter is formed, there is an almost endless diversity. The mining-bees form their excavations very commonly in the sunny sides of cliffs and sand-banks, or in hard and beaten pathways-this latter fact having been noticed so long ago as the days of Homer. The carpenter-bees tunnel out old posts and railings, or the decaying trunks of trees. The masons build their nests within the boles of trees and the cracks of walls, and sometimes in such curious places as the empty shells of snails, that lie half-buried in hedge-banks. Some of the smaller species tunnel out the pith of bramblestems; while others find a convenient abode in the hollow tubes of straw thatch. No place that can in any way be made available comes amiss; and he "who loves to hear the wild-bees' hum," and follows them in their various haunts, to study the details of their history, will often be struck with their strange and wonderful devices in obviating difficulties, and accommodating themselves to circumstances. In the course of the past summer, we discovered a most singular habit of one of the carpenter-bees, which, it appears, has never before been observed. The bee in question is a little fellow, with a thin, elongated body, and rejoices in the name of Chilostoma florisomne, which, however frightful it may look in entomological Latin, is both pretty and appropriate when rendered into English as the "lip-mouthed flower-sleeper." The first part of this name speaks for itself, and the second is thus explained: Our little bee is of a convivial turn, and is given to staying out of nights. At times, therefore, of a summer evening, instead of returning home to the old post or rail in which its nest is tunneled out, it betakes itself, with some half dozen boon companions, to a capacious dandelion, and there makes a night of it. The darkness coming on, the flower, of course, shuts up; and then the boozy company, huddled up together, have to pass the night as best they can. In early morning, when the flowers are first opening to the sunshine, you may often light upon these little knots of topers, in that stupid, half-awake condition which plainly warns you they have had a jovial night. The thing is of constant occurrence, and hence the name the little tipplers bear. Now for our discovery, which relates, indeed, to another, and still stranger manner in which this little bee sometimes passes the midnight hours. In searching along a hedge-row one afternoon, we came upon a spot where we observed a number of small bees flying about a dead bush of hawthorn, which had been thrust into the hedge to stop a gap, and some old posts close by, which were thickly perforated with their holes. Looking closely at the dead and leafless bush, we were surprised at seeing a considerable number of the bees impaled, apparently, on the points of the thorns; but a nearer inspection showed us that the little fellows were not impaled, but voluntarily holding on to the thornpoints with their mandibles, their bodies being held out straight and rigid, and their legs folded placidly beneath. Our presence in no way interrupted them, and continual fresh arrivals at the bush came and settled within a few inches of us. It was a curious spectacle, and we watched it intently. The little fellows all assumed their attitude of repose in the same manner, first alighting on a twig of the bush, then getting on the chosen thorn, with their heads toward the point, and when at the very extremity, turning themselves round, seizing the point with their mandibles, and stretching out their bodies straight and stiff. It was getting late, and, suspecting the insects were settling themselves for the night, we visited them again early the following morning, when, to our astonishment, the thorns were still bristling with bees, that had apparently remained motionless throughout this night, still holding on by their jaws alone! We wrenched off a twig with a dozen of the bees attached to it, and yet not one of them relaxed its hold we held it up, swung it as we went along, and still they held on, and kept their bodies out as rigid as before! And Rogers, again, in his verses on the fire-flies of the Tusculan groves, in his poem "Italy," gives us "him" and "his" throughout in his references to the glowworm. Both Montgomery and Moore, however, give the lady beetle the credit that is her due, and doubtless assign the true reason for the display, when, as the former says, she lights her lamp "To captive her favorite fly, And tempt the rover through the dark." The two sexes of this insect differ greatly from each other in appearance; the female the glow-worm-being a wingless, elongate, soft-bodied creature, possessed, however, of six legs, and in other respects very unlike a "worm ;" while the male is a true beetle, endowed with wings and wing-cases of ample size, but able to emit only a very faint light in comparison with that of his more brilliant mate. We have two of these insects which flew to us one summer night while sitting with a lamp at an open window, the little rovers having doubtless been attracted by the light, mistaking it possibly for an unusual display on the part of some fair lady. The weather, we should observe, was cold and windy; and thinking that possibly the determined inactivity of the insects It is a pity to say anything ungracious was thus to be accounted for, we took a about a little creature so wrapped up in twig, with some of them attached to it, poetical associations and pleasant memointo a warm room, when they almost im- ries as the glow-worm, and yet the truth mediately relaxed their hold, and began to must be told. It feeds, then, good reader walk about. But, on removing the twig-not on violets and primroses, nor even quickly to an empty fire-place, where the on the common greenery of the hedgerows insects were exposed to a constant current-but on flesh-the flesh of snails; and of cold air, they immediately attached themselves as before, and remained without moving for upward of thirty hours! eats it most voraciously! Well may we say with Mr. Douglas: Let us draw a vail over the scene, and, as with some examples of human genius, be content with the ultimate luster, without inquiring into the minutiae of its origin and support. The pleasures of entomology are only half enjoyed by the stay-at-home student. In order to know what the delights of the science really are, one must go forth No order of insects, perhaps, exhibits a greater variety of forms and and of corresponding habits than the Coleoptera, or beetle tribe, not including, however, the so-called black-beetle, which in reality is not a beetle at all, but a near connection of the cricket and the grasshopper. In exchange for the "black beetle," the cole-a-field, and study the busy tribes in their opterist claims the glow-worm, which is his of right, with a good many of the "fireflies" of tropic lands. It is now pretty well known that it is the female glowworm alone that lights up the little lamp to be seen in our hedgerows in summer, although the poets have very commonly assigned the function to the male. Thus Shakspeare has : "The glow-worm shows the matin to be near, And 'gins to pale his ineffectual fire.” own proper homes; and there is this additional advantage in so doing, that, besides attaining his special object, in the observation or collecting of insects, the entomologist enjoys, as few others can, the beautiful scenes among which he plies his vocation. It is quite true, "Fortune and Nature are earnest females, though popular beauties; and they do not look upon coquettish triflers in the light of genuine wooers." |