AFFECTION FOR THE YOUNG. 517 



with the Anolna and the Ptini, but these prefer dry manufactured 

 wood, paper, c. ; they consequently produce, in their larva state, the 

 same injury to furniture and libraries. The fur beetles and fur moths 

 also are destructive only in their larva state, and it is by the care 

 of the mother that they are deposited in furs and wool, which they use 

 as food. The Chrysomelce, as larvae, live upon leaves, and are deposited 

 upon them in their egg state by the mother ; the Curculios, which 

 prefer especially the seeds of plants, are deposited in flowers as eggs, 

 and during the development of the fruit they devour its substance, for 

 which purpose nature produced them, and then, instead of a shell pro- 

 ducing a kernel, it produces a beetle. 



All the other orders furnish us with similar instances of the affection 

 of the parent for her progeny. It would lead us too far were we thus 

 to go through them individually to show their consimility by adduc- 

 ing instances ; we will merely remark, that the large order of the 

 Lepidoptera, throughout all its members, exhibits the same anxiety 

 and care in depositing their eggs. Almost all caterpillars feed upon 

 leaves, and therefore almost all eggs are deposited upon the plants 

 themselves, or in their proximity. The majority are much exposed, 

 and are therefore enveloped by peculiar coverings, which the mother, 

 precisely as among the birds, procures from her own body. Others 

 have, instead, a hard glue-like case, over which a second woollen cover- 

 ing is spread. The fruit moths deposit their eggs upon ripening fruit, 

 unripe fruit they will not touch. 



The eggs of the Orthoptera are deposited in general in the earth, 

 usually in particular holes dug expressly for this purpose by the 

 female, and which are again closed so soon as she has placed all her 

 eggs therein. As the young immediately after their development 

 seek the light, and feed upon leaves of all kinds, provision furnished 

 by the parent was here also unnecessary ; whereas the Diptera and 

 Hemiptera lay their eggs generally in such places as the developed 

 larva can immediately find food. We thus find the eggs of the 

 Syrphodea among the plant lice, which the larva devours, or in the 

 nests of the bees and wasps, whose honey they help to devour. The 

 eggs of the true flies (Muscce) are laid by the mother in dung or 

 carrion, which substances constitute the food of the larvae. The 

 gnats let their eggs fall into the water ; here the larvae are deve- 

 loped, and one species of them devours the other with as much voracity 

 as they themselves are again seized by the larger larvae of the water 



