COLEOPTERA CLERIDiF.. 263 



These insects which seldom exceed an inch in length, and are 

 generally handsomely variegated in their colours, frequent flowers ; 

 others, howevei-, are found upon and under the bark of old trees, stumps, 

 dry wood, &c., where they have passed the larva state, during which 

 period, as far as has been hitherto observed, they are carnivorous. 



The species of the genus Clems are amongst the largest of the fa- 

 mily ; having the elytra generally of a bright red colour, ornamented 

 with purple spots or fasciee. They frequent flowers, the honey of which 

 they extract by means of their beautifully ciliated maxillae ; but in 

 the larva state they are very destructive to bees and wasps, in the 

 nests of which the females deposit their eggs, during the absence of 

 those insects, upon whose grubs the larvae of the Clerus, when hatched, 

 prey ; the C. apiarius selecting the hive bee, and the C. alvearius 

 (Jiff. 29. I.) the mason bees (Osmia and Megachile). The larvae 

 (Jiff. 29. 9.) are of a beautiful red colour. Mr. Stephens describes those 

 of C. alvearius as having a bluish spot on the scutellum ; Latreille, 

 however, from whom this description is derived, alludes to the spot 

 near the scutellum of the imago (Regtie An., first edition, 3. 256.). 

 The upper lip is distinct and emarginate, and the antennte 4-jointed 

 (Jiff. 29. lo.). They are furnished with six scaly legs, and two cor- 

 neous points at the extremity of the last segment of the abdomen, 

 which has also a fleshy retractile proleg on the underside {Jiff. 29. ll.). 

 Schrank was of opinion that the Clerus deposits its eggs in the flowers 

 frequented by bees, which conveyed them into the nest with the 

 pollen ; but such a mode of oviposition is inconsistent with the great 

 care shown by female insects in selecting the most proper places for 

 the reception of their eggs. The larva, when hatched, first devours 

 the grub of the bee in the cell in which it is born, and then proceeds 

 from cell to cell, preying upon the inhabitant of each until arrived at 

 maturity. It is in this situation, also, that it undergoes its changes 

 in a small cocoon, which it has previously constructed, making its 

 escape from the nest in the beetle state, when the hardness of its co- 

 vering sufficiently defends it from the stings of the bees. Swammer- 

 dam was the first author who described the habits of these beetles, 

 having found the larva, or, as he calls it, a red worm, in the nest of a 

 mason bee. This worm, figured by him (tab. 2Q.f.S. «.), changed 

 into a nymph (b). " But this nymph, after (in) the space of a whole 

 year, did not change into a bee, but into a very beautiful beetle ; nor 



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