30 OUR HOUSEHOLD INSECTS 



snugly nestling under the very camphor that had been 

 inserted for its destruction, in utter scorn of all such 

 precautions. Its smaller size, too, renders it a more 

 difficult enemy to guard against than Dermestes, as it 

 can both enter through smaller interstices and is less 

 conspicuous, though not less destructive when once an 

 entrance has been effected. 



Still keeping to the great section of the Club-horns, 

 we come now to a minute insect called Mycetoea hirta 

 (Fig. 13). This little creature has 

 been at times bandied about from 

 one family to another, and its true 

 location is difficult to determine. It 

 is only one -sixteenth inch long, of a 

 pale chestnut colour, with rows of 

 large and deep (comparatively) pits or 

 " punctures " on the elytra, (the word 

 FIG. 13. Mycetsea punctures, as used in entomology, does 

 not imply complete perforation, but 

 merely indicates sudden and minute depressions, usually 

 circular in form) ; the whole surface of the insect is 

 beset somewhat scantily with long coarse hairs, which 

 stand out like chevaux-de-frise all over its body, and 

 have gained for it the name of hirta, "hairy." The 

 thorax seems as though its lateral edges had been turned 

 up, folded back, and fastened down along the sides of 

 the dorsal surface, somewhat as the edge of a piece of 

 needlework is folded over to make a "hem." It is 

 obvious, when one remembers the small size of the 

 insect, that none of these peculiarities can be seen with- 

 out the aid of a lens. This little insect is an inhabitant 

 of old wine-cellars, where it feeds upon the fungoid 

 incrustations on the walls, and, according to some, also 

 attacks the corks of the bottles. Some people, however,. 



