COLEOrTERA. 47 



found on flowers. They creep slowly, and generally fall to the 

 ground on being touched. They fly both by day and night. 

 Their food, in the beetle states, appears to be chiefly derived 

 from flowers; but some devour the tender leaves of plants. 



The largest of our spring-beetles is the Elater {Alans) ocida- 

 tus, of Linnaeus. It is of a black color; the thorax is oblong 

 square, and nearly one third the length of the whole body, 

 covered above with a whitish })owder, and with a large oval 

 velvet-black spot, like an eye, on each side of the middle, from 

 which the insect derives its name ocidahis, or eyed; the wing- 

 covers are marked with slender longitudinal impressed lines, 

 and are sprinkled with numerous white dots ; the under side of 

 the body, and the legs, are covered with a white mealy powder. 

 This large beetle measures from one inch and a quarter to one 

 inch and three quarters in length. It is found on trees, fences, 

 and the sides of buildings, in June and July. It undergoes its 

 transformations in the trunks of trees. I have found many of 

 them in old apple-trees, together with their larvae, which eat 

 the wood, and from which I subsequently obtained the insects 

 in the beetle state. These larvae are reddish yellow grubs, 

 proportionally much broader than the other kinds, and very 

 much flattened. One of them, which was found fully grown 

 early in April, measured two inches and a half in length, and 

 nearly four tenths of an inch across the middle of the body, 

 and was not much narrowed at either extremity. The head 

 was broad, brownish, and rough above; the upper jaws or 

 nippers were very strong, curved, and pointed; the eyes were 

 small and two in number, one being placed at the base of each 

 of the short antennae ; the last segment of the body was black- 

 ish, rough with little sharp-pointed warts, with a deep semicir- 

 cular notch at the end, and furnished around the sides with 

 little teeth, the tw"o hindmost of which were long, forked, and 

 curved upwards like hooks ; under this segment was a large 

 retractile fleshy prop-foot, armed behind with little claws, and 

 around the sides with short spines ; the true legs were six, a 

 pair to each of the first three rings ; and were tipped with a 

 single claw. Soon after this grub was found it cast its skin 

 and became a pupa, and in due time the latter was transformed 

 to a beetle. 



