LABOURS OF THE DOR BEETLE. 119 



the Beetle discovers a patch of cowdung, alights near it, crawls 

 upon it, and straightway burrows through the soft material, 

 and is lost to sight. When she — for it is the female who 

 does the work — reaches the earth, she does not cease to burrow, 

 but goes on with her labour until she has excavated a perpen- 

 dicular tunnel some twelve inches in depth, and carried a 

 quantity of the cowdung into it. In this substance she de- 

 posits an egg, crawls out of the burrow, and proceeds to make 

 another, and so goes on until she has laid all her eggs. 



The egg remains in its concealment until it is hatched, and 

 then the larva consumes the food which its mother has taken 

 the trouble to bring down for it. After this is eaten, the grub 

 is strong enough to ascend the burrow and obtain as much 

 food as it wants at the entrance. Within this retreat the larva 

 passes through its transformations, and then ascends to the 

 outer air, ready to take its part in the work of pa-eparing 

 nurseries for a future progeny. Five species of Geotrupes are 

 known in England. Twice as many species have been described, 

 but recent investigations have shown that exactly half the 

 supposed species were simple varieties. 



On Woodcut XIII. Fig. 1, is represented a Beetle of a very 

 odd appearance, the sides of the thorax being prolonged into a 

 pair of very formidable horns, a shorter horn occupying the 

 centre of the anterior margin. This is the male Typhceus 

 vulgaris, the only British example of the genus. The female 

 has only the veriest rudiments of horns, the anterior angles of 

 the thorax being merely developed into a short, sharp pro- 

 minence, like the teeth of a saw, while the place of the centra- 

 horn is taken by a ridge running across the forehead. Indeed, 

 owing to the absence of these horns, the female is so unlike 

 the other sex, that no one who was ignorant of entomology 

 would be likely to believe the two creatures to be nothing 

 more than different sexes of the same insect. The female so 

 closely resembles the ordinary Dor Beetle, that the older 

 entomologists comprised the Typhosus within tlie genus Geo- 

 trupes. 



The name of Typhceus was given to this genus in the days 

 when classical mythology was the source of new names for 

 insects, and to this genus the name of Typrohus was given on 



