The Glow-Worm and Other Beetles 



from the thousand enemies that threaten 

 them ; for, as long as the frosts of winter have 

 not arrived, these open galleries are trodden 

 by Spiders, by Acari, by Anthrenus-grubs and 

 other plunderers, to whom these eggs, or the 

 young larvae about to emerge from them, 

 must be a dainty feast. In consequence of 

 the mother's heedlessness, the number of 

 those who escape all these voracious hunters 

 and the inclemencies of the weather must be 

 curiously small. This perhaps explains why 

 she is compelled to make up by her fecundity 

 for her deficient industry. 



The hatching occurs a month later, about 

 the end of September or the beginning of 

 October. The season being still propitious, 

 I was led to suppose that the young larvae 

 must at once make a start and disperse, in 

 order that each might seek to gain access, 

 through some imperceptible fissure, to an 

 Anthophora-cell. This presumption turned 

 out to be entirely at fault. In the boxes in 

 which I had placed the eggs laid by my cap- 

 tives, the young larvae, little black creatures 

 at most a twenty-fifth of an inch long, did 

 not move away, provided though they were 

 with vigorous legs; they remained higgledy- 

 piggledy with the white skins of the eggs 

 whence they had emerged. 

 44 



