COLEOPTERA. 159 



smaller and lighter colored. It is active, and burrows 

 in the ground, but seems to take little nourishment. 

 In a few days the larva transforms to a pupa (PI. VII., 

 Fig. 112, pupa oi Epicauta cinerea, Forst.), and in 

 five or six days the imago (PI. VII., Fig. 113) is fully 

 formed. This pecuHar mode of development is known 

 as hypermetamorphosis. It is instructive because, 

 although beginning its existence as a Campodea-like 

 form with well-developed legs, the Epicauta becomes, 

 by the laws of variation and adaptation governing ani- 

 mals, a creature with small, weak, tuberculous legs and 

 a grub-like form. This process of reduction is not 

 carried so far as in the Stylopid^, and the young Epi- 

 cauta never becomes entirely legless. 



The genus Meloe of this family is not uncommon 

 in Massachusetts. It is a dark-blue beetle, with small, 

 short, and quite soft elytra and no wings. This re- 

 duction in the size and number of the wing- covers 

 and wings is carried still farther in Hornia jiiiuutipeii- 

 nis, Riley, where both males and females are without 

 wings, and, practically, without elytra, as these are 

 extremely small. 



The larvce of Meloe, instead -of feeding upon the 

 eggs of the locust, devour those of the bee (Antho- 

 phora), to which they are transported by clinging to 

 the hairy body of the mother. The second larva 

 feeds upon the honey in the cell intended for the 

 young bee. The coarctate stage or pseudo-pupa is 

 then passed through, giving rise to an active fourth 

 (usually called third) larval form, which eats its way 

 out of the cell and goes into the true pupa stage, from 

 which the beetle emerges. In Sitaris, the same his- 



