ORDER I. BEETLES. 55 



The PAINTED CAPRICORN (Ctytus pictus). This beautiful 

 insect is one of our autumnal visitors, 



Figure 13. 



and one of the corr.tless host of evi 

 dences that the rolling year is full, only 

 as every season brings its own peculiar 

 charms. Spring is the time of youth, 

 of buds, and of flowers; autumn the 

 harvest of maturity, of blossoms, and 

 of fruit. If the merry month of May j, 

 adorns our woods and meadows with 



Painted Capricorn. 



their youthful vegetation, their chirping 

 birds and delicate flowers, so is the beginning of autumn 

 none the less lavish in its golden harvest of grain, its melo 

 dious songsters, and its crown of brilliant flowers. There, 

 from the red-leaved bushes, the tall Rudbeckia peeps out 

 its golden head ; here, the blue Vernonias and Liatris min 

 gle with the yellow Helianthus and Coreopsis, forming showy 

 figures upon the green velvet carpet of the field ; while the 

 purple and white Eupatoriums, blending with the rosy Spi- 

 reas and crimson Cardinal flowers, and all bordered by the 

 variegated Asters and perfumed Golden-rod, form one magic 

 sheet of kaleidoscopic images ! 



It is upon the slender Golden-rod, feasting upon the pol 

 len of its flowers and upon its aromatic leaves, that we see 

 the handsome little Painted Capricorn Beetle. This insect 

 is little more than half an inch long, and of a cylindrical 

 form. Its whole body is black, and looks like velvet. Its 

 head and thorax are crossed with yellow lines, and its wing- 

 covers are marked with lines, triangles, and spots of the 

 same color. Its antennre are half as long as its body, and 

 its legs of a reddish brown color. 



Although this Beetle is seen in the month of September 

 feeding upon the flower-dust of the Golden-rod, its children 

 have a different taste. Hence the female deposits her eggs 

 in the crevices of the bark of locust-trees, and the grubs 



