FOOD EATEN BY GROUND BEETLES. 89 
instinctive knowledge of their powers, for small parties settled along 
the worm with their heads opposite to each other, and thus pulling 
hard with all their powers against each other with their strong 
mandibles, they soon tore through the skin. On examination about an 
hour afterwards, I found that some parts of the worm were not 
noticeably injured, but much of it was worked away into a mere thread 
of gnawed shapeless matter. There was no apparent difference in the 
eating-powers of the two kinds of beetles, and after about two hours 
and a half they appeared to have had enough; but afterwards, on 
some fresh Strawberries being given them, some of the beetles went 
at the fruit immediately. 
The savage ferocity with which the beetles ran at their food and 
tore it to pieces by daylight on being taken from the tin in which they 
had travelled, was no doubt owing to their long fast, but the method 
of attack was the same in their ordinary customs. With uncooked 
meat they would fairly tug at a small piece to detach it, and then 
walk away to eat it at leisure; and on one occasion I found one of 
each of the two species of beetles holding on to one piece of meat, and 
dragging it and each other in all directions in their struggle to 
possess it. 
The daily examination showed they worked at their Strawberries ; 
but all other kinds of fruit which I supplied them with appeared to be 
totally untouched, neither would they have anything to do with some 
egg-shell still containing some moisture within. Uncooked mutton 
they ate greedily, notwithstanding that a slight sprinkling of salt had 
been given to the joint from which it had been taken; and cooked 
meat, such as rabbit kidney, or cooked haddock or salmon, appeared 
quite acceptable. Bread, when given in a rather thin slice, they 
pierced through with small holes up to about an eighth to three- 
sixteenths of an inch in diameter. They did not, however, prey upon 
each other, although they attacked the soft parts of a Sirea gigas (the 
Great Pine Wood Wasp), which had been sent me for identification, 
and was still fresh. 
The above observations I carried on at their somewhat tedious 
length relatively to the opinion held in the infested districts of the 
beetle attack being very probably connected with the use of ash-pit 
clearings for manure, in which all kinds of scraps of animal matter 
are thrown, and the result, so far as was shown by the small scale on 
which I was able to experiment, as well as the quantity of beetles 
attracted by the ‘ pieces of flesh’’ (see p. 85) placed as traps, appears 
to point strongly to the probable attraction of what may be called gar- 
bage. Once established, the H. rujicornis, the brownest of the beetles, 
which is furnished with powerful wings, and which uses them for 
flight at night, would spread wherever the presence of the ripe fruit 
