IIJ 



Marvels of Insect Life, 



care to place them in the ground very near to the burrows of anthophora. This 

 probabl}^ explains the smaller number of the eggs, as it will be seen that the chances 

 of a grub getting attached to the right bee are much greater. The egg-laying takes 

 place in August, and the eggs hatch about the end of September. There are well- 

 stored honev-cells close at hand, and one would expect that the little black sitaris 

 triungulins would at once go to them and begin feeding. But the sensation of 

 hunger is at present unknown to them ; they simply huddle together, and pass the 

 winter where they were born. In spring — about April or May — they wake up 

 and begin to look about them. Should any hairy Insect come within reach, 

 whether it be bee, fly, or beetle, they seize upon it. Here is another failure of 

 " unerring instinct," for the vast majority seize the wrong carrier, and get no 

 further on their proper road. The first of the new anthophoras to issue from their 

 cells are males ; and as these hang about in their burrows for several days waiting 

 for their wings and integumerits to harden properly, a number of the triungulins 

 have a good opportunity for attaching themselves, and they take advantage of 

 it. But they appear to know that thev have not yet got hold of the Insect that 



can directly help them to work out 

 their destiny. About a month 

 later the female bees emerge, and 

 as these are being courted by the 

 males the triungulins contrive to 

 transfer themselves from one to 

 the other. The females busy 

 themselves, of course, in the 

 making of cells, and the triungulin, 

 knowing that it has reached its 

 Photo by] [E.step,F.L.s. destination, gets off as soon as the 



bee has laid an egg on the store of 

 honey. The cell is sealed up, and 

 the little sitaris proceeds to feed 

 upon the egg. This repast lasts for about eight days, and then the sitaris 

 casts its skin, and emerges as a very different creature, with exceedingly short 

 legs and a shortened, inflated body, which enables it to float on the honey with 

 safety. Its spiracles or breathing-holes are placed along each side of the 

 back, instead of along the sides as usual in larvae, so that it can breathe 

 without risk of the spiracles becoming clogged by the honey. The only 

 exertion demanded of it is the sucking up of the honey ; and there is enough 

 of this to occupy it for about forty days. This brings it to the middle of 

 July, when it changes again, becoming much like the puparium of a fly. In this 

 condition it may remain for a month, or for eight months. Those of the shorter 

 period return to much the same condition as that in which they consumed the 

 honey. A little later it becomes a chrysalis, and in August or September it emerges 

 as a sitaris beetle. The tardy individuals pass the winter in the false-pupal coriSition 

 and finish their changes in spring. This, it will be seen, is one of the most com- 

 plicated and remarkable of Insect life-histories. 



Common Oil-Beetle. 



A common Insect by the side of paths in spring. It gets its name from its 

 habit of e.xuding a yellow, oily fluid with an unpleasant odour from its leg- 

 joints. Its life-history is one of the most remarkable even of Insect 

 stories. Twice the natural size. 



