Beetles 



203 



of which the pupa stays a month remodeUing itself 

 into the form of a heetle. 



These little incidents are what give interest, 

 they are the things that happen in life, and that is 

 the reason I tell you boys that live specimens are 

 much more interesting than dead ones. When I 

 was a small chap hke you fellows I used to make 

 myself little cages for menageries of beetles, and 

 sometimes used two thin 

 disks of cork for the top 

 and bottom of the cage 

 and long bright pins for 

 bars (Fig. 177). 



To-day, however, you 

 have the wire-screen net- 

 ting with which to make 

 cages of all kinds, whereas when we boys of yester- 

 day were building cages for wild beetles we had 

 only mosquito netting. 



An ordinary square glass aquarium, the bottom 

 of which is covered with a layer of sand an inch 

 and one-half thick (Fig. 17-i) and one end of 

 which is banked up with sand and moss half way 

 up the side, may be made into a land-and-water 

 affair by putting in enough water to cover the 



177 



