43^ THE INSECT WORLD. 



without opening the elytra (Fig. 423). When seized, it pours out 

 from the extremity of its abdomen a foetid liquid, the only means of 

 defence the poor insect possesses. The larva (Fig. 424) much 

 resembles the larva of the cockchafers, but the legs are shorter. It 

 is found in rotten wood, and often in ants' nests. When it has 

 acquired its full development it makes a cocoon of an oval form 

 (Fig. 423), in which it transforms itself into a pupa; the cocoon is 

 composed of bits of wood agglomerated with a silky matter which 

 the larva secretes. 



The larva of the Cetonia splendidula which is the most mag- 

 nificent found in France is met with sometimes in the nests of wild 

 bees. In Russia the rose beetle is considered a verv efficacious 



Fig. 424. Larva and cocoon of the Rose Beetle. 



remedy for hydrophobia. In the governorship of Saratow, which is 

 traversed by the Volga, hydrophobia is very frequent, on account of 

 the heats which reign during the whole summer in its arid steppes. 

 The inhabitants, incessantly exposed to be bitten by mad dogs, have 

 tried in succession a great many preparations to remedy the results 

 of these terrible accidents. It appears that the Cetonia, dried and 

 reduced to powder, has produced on many occasions good effects. 

 This is the recipe which an inhabitant of Saratow published in a 

 Russian journal adding, that he had employed it for thirty years, 

 that not one of the patients treated by him had died, and that his 

 remedy could be employed with success in all the phases of the 

 disease : In spring they search at the bottom of the nests of the 

 wood ant for certain white larvae, which they carefully preserve in a 

 pot, together with the earth in which they were found, till the 

 moment of their metamorphosis, which takes place in the month of 

 May. The insect, which is the common rose beetle, is killed, dried, 



