154 THE UNIVERSE. 



pushes the ball into it, and leaves it to its fate. And thus 

 the arduous work is finished. 



It was these remarkable labors which drew the attention 

 of the ancients to the insect. In ancient Egypt, where men 

 marvelled at this prodigious care, the sacred Scaraboeus be- 

 came the symbol of fecundity, and sculpture multiplied to 

 infinity its image on all the monuments of the Pharaohs, 

 from the mouth of the kino; of rivers to the heart of 

 Nubia. On the other hand, the perseverance with which 

 the dung-beetle rolls up its ball again, like Sisyphus in the 

 fable, seemed to some to offer a reminiscence of the labors 

 of Isis and Osiris. Hence we see it represented everywhere 

 on the pediments of their temples, having its ball, an em- 

 blem of the globe placed between its legs. 1 



1 This at least is the opinion avowed by M. Latreille, in his Memoire sur !es 

 Insectes Sacre's. Nothing is more common than sculptures and paintings repre- 

 senting the Searabaeus, or sacred dung-beetle of the Egyptians, and even some 

 real ones have been discovered in the sarcophagi. Some of the artificial beetles 

 met with among the monuments on the borders of the Nile were pierced so as to 

 form necklaces for women ; others were used as seals, as is shown by the inscrip- 

 tions beneath them. 



Among the people of Egypt the effigy of the sacred beetle has been repeated 

 in a thousand different ways, as though it were a kind of tutelary god. It is seen 

 everywhere carved on their monuments, temples, tombs, and obelisks ; there are 

 even some represented on most bas-reliefs, and they are found at the present day 

 sculptured of all dimensions, and in every possible material, from the commonest 

 stones to the most precious metals. There are some of colossal size in the Brit- 

 ish Museum ; they are of granite, and three to four feet long. But for common 

 use they were made of very small dimensions and in prodigious quantities ; they 

 are found of marble, porphyry, agate, lapis-lazuli, garnet, and gold. 



In my narrative I have conformed to the opinions of French zoologists, but it 

 is probable that when the history of the dung-beetle has been thoroughly studied, 

 we shall not hear that it is in spring, hut in autumn or the beginning of winter, that 

 they form their balls. Indeed, it was in October that I saw, for the first time, 



