218 MODERN CLASSIFICATION OF INSECTS. 



as having also been practised with the Melolonthaj (Act 2. scene the 

 last) ; we may, perhaps, question the propriety of Mr. MacLeay's con- 

 jecture : the Grecian boys, however, only tied a string round the legs of 

 the beetle instead of putting a pin through its tail. (Strutt's Spoi'ts, 

 p. 390., Hone's edition.) 



These insects are very intimately allied to the Anoplognathidte 

 (from which they differ in their labrum and toothed maxillae), and 

 RutelidEe which have the mesosternum generally porrected. The 

 structure of the mouth, however, as well as the variation in the tarsal 

 claws are characters by which they are most closely associated with 

 the last named family ; indeed the genera Hexodon and Chalepus 

 appear to form a perfect passage, the latter genus being associated 

 with the Rutelidfe by Latreille, and with the Melolonthidas by 

 MacLeay, From the Glaphyridae and Cetoniida^ they are at once 

 distinguished by the corneous structure of their mandibles and 

 maxillae. 



The common Cockchafer (Scarabaeus Melolontha Linn. Melolon- 

 tha vulgaris i^«5r.), is, at the same time, the best known, most common, 

 and destructive of the Coleopterous insects, flying about in swarms in the 

 evenings of May and June, resting during the day in hedges and trees, 

 upon the leaves of which they feed most voraciously, sometimes de- 

 foliating extensive districts ; the females burrow into the earth and 

 there depositing their eggs, the larvae are hatched at the end of six 

 weeks, and are generally known by the name of the white worm, and 

 in Ireland, the Connaught worm*, devouring the roots of grass, in 

 which state they continue for several years, and when numerous they 

 are very injurious by completely stripping the ground of foliage, which 

 dies off in consequence of the roots being eaten. In certain years 

 these insects have appeared in such vast numbers that their ravages 

 have been almost as extensive as those of the locusts. I cannot do 

 more than refer to a paper by Baker in the Philos. Trans, vol. xliv., 

 and another by Pvlolyneux in the same Transactions for 1697, and to 

 the statements recorded by Moufiet in his Theatrum Insectoriwi; 

 to the Memoir in Phil. Trans, of the Dublin Society ; also to Mr. 

 Dillwyn's Memoranda of Swansea Coleoptera, p. 31.; and to Ander- 

 son, in Recreations in Agriculture, vol. iii. p. 420., who states that 



* See Dryander, Cat. ]3anl;s, Lihr. sub Connaught Worm. Bingley Anim, 

 Biogr. vol. iii. p. 233, 



