116 INSECTS AT HOME. 



rubied off, and the beauty of the specimen greatly impaired ; 

 so that a really perfect specimen even of so common a Beetle is 

 worth having. 



The life history of this insect demands a brief notice. The 

 female deposits her eggs in the ground, where in due time they 

 are hatched, and straightway begin to feed upon the roots of 

 grass, which form the chief part of their diet. They remain in 

 the ground for three years, continually destroying grass-roots, 

 and increasing to a wonderful size ; so large and fat, indeed, that 

 their tightened skin seems scarcely able to hold its contents. 

 And when they are dissected, it really seems still more wonderful 

 that they should not have burst with sheer fat and gorging. I 

 have opened numbers of them, and found them more trouble- 

 some than any other larvae, the quantity of fat being so enor- 

 mous that the spirits of wine in which they were sunk had to 

 be changed over and over again before it was sufficiently clear 

 to allow the structure to be seen. Then, even when that diffi- 

 culty was overcome, another remained, for the whole of the 

 stomach and intestines was so crammed with a mixture of grass- 

 roots and earth, that it looked like a well-stuffed and very 

 black sausage, with a very thin skin. The quantity of roots 

 consumed by one of these insects is very great ; and in some 

 places they have so completely destroyed the grass, that the 

 turf has been completely detached from the ground, and might 

 be rolled up by hand as easily as if the tvu-f-cutter's spade had 

 passed under it. These mischievous grubs do not confine 

 themselves to grass-roots, but eat many of the underground 

 crops, the potato often suffering terribly from them. " One of 

 these larvse is shown on Plate V. Fig. 9, as it appears when 

 about one-third grown. 



I believe that the rooks are our best friends with regard to 

 this grub — technically known as White-worm in some parts 

 of England. They seem to be able to detect the presence of 

 the grub by hearing its teeth at work on the grass-roots, and 

 then, pecking a hole with wonderful rapidity, they drag out 

 the grub and take it home to their young. The rooks, in fact, 

 aid us in ridding our grass lands of the White-worm just as 

 do the starlings in destroying the larvae of the daddy-long-legs. 



When full-fed, the grub makes for itself a cocoon in the 

 earth, and then emerges, only to work as much destruction 



