274: 



HALF HOTXRS WITH INSECTS. [Packakl 



mon in the United States, is black and oval in shape, and 

 would be readily mistaken for a pellet of bird's dung. Wal- 

 lace quotes the statement of an observer, who had more 

 than once mistaken an English moth, Cilix compressa, a 

 little white and gray moth, "for a piece of bird's dung 

 dropped upon a leaf, and vice versa, the dung for a 11:0th." 

 Wallace also tells us that "there are in the oast small bee- 

 tles of the family Buprestidse, which generally res'", ca the 

 midrib of a leaf, and the naturalist often hesitates before 

 picking them off, so closely do they resemble pieces of bird's 

 dung." The same might be said of the little dark brownish, 

 bronzed Brach3-s often seen in midsummer resting motion- 

 less on the leaves of the oak. 



Some carrion beetles are dark, like the decaying bodies 

 under which they live, and so are their larvte, but why ether 



Fig. 212. Fig. 213. 



Attageiuis Larva. 



Anthrenus and j'oung. 



forms, like the Necrophori and Necrophili, are banded s<j 

 conspicuously with red or 3ellow, does not seem clear to us. 

 Many of the small Catops, the Nitidulae, the Staphylini, are 

 dark red or brown or black, these colors harmonizing with 

 the sombre tints of the decaying substances on which they 

 ^Tve. I have noticed that the Antherophagus ochraceus, a 

 duix ochreous reddish beetle, is uf the same hue as the cells 

 of the humble bee, in which they are often exceedingly 

 common. The Dermestes, Attagenus (Fig. 212, larva) and 



18 



