260 MEANS OF DEFENCE OF INSECTS. 



Reaumur, in order to ascertain how far this covering 

 was necessary, removed it, and put the animal into a 

 glass, at one time with a silk cocoon, and at another 

 with raspings of paper. In the first instance, in the 

 space of an hour it had clothed itself with particles 

 of the silk ; and in the second, being again laid bare, 

 it found the paper so convenient a material, that it 

 made of it a coat of unusual thickness^. 



Insects in general are remarkable for their cleanli- 

 ness ; — however filthy the substances which they inha- 

 bit, yet they so manage as to keep themselves person- 

 ally neat. Several, however, by no means deserve 

 this character ; and I fear you w ill scarcely credit me 

 when I tell you that some shelter themselves under an 

 umbrella formed of their own excrement ! You will 

 exclaim, perhaps, that there is no parallel case in all 

 nature ; — it may be so; — yet as I am bound to confess 

 the faults of insects as well as to extol their virtues, I 

 must not conceal from you this opprobrium. Beetles 

 of three ditferent genera are given to this Hottentot 

 habit. The first to which I shall introduce you is one 

 that has long been celebrated under the name of the 

 beetle of the lily (Lona merdigera, F., Cantaride de* 

 Gigli, Vallisn.). The larvje of this insect have a very 

 tender skin, which appears to require some covering 

 from the impressions of the external air and from the 

 rays of the sun ; and it finds nothing so well adapted 

 to answer these purposes, and probably also to conceal 

 itself from the birds, as its own excrement, with which 

 it covers itself in the following manner. Its anus is re- 

 markably situated, being on the back of the last seg- 



* Ileaum. iii. 391. 



