CHAFERS AND CLOCKS 221 



useless wing-cases, which have to be lifted clear of the 

 wings, and seem to offer considerable resistance to the air. 

 Beetles not only take flight laboriously, but seem to alight 

 with an obvious sense of relief; many are very awkward 

 steerers, like barges in a tideway, and have difficulty in 

 fetching up where they wish. For this reason they dislike 

 windy days, and perform their voyages in still weather. 

 The air of adventure and difficulty with which they fly has 

 its own attraction ; most wild creatures seem to perform 

 their functions with such effortless perfection that there is 

 something very human and comprehensible about the beetle's 

 awkward endeavours. It is very interesting to watch the 

 packing and unpacking of the wings beneath their horny 

 coverings, and the beetle's solemn dive into the air when 

 its wings are ready to be spread is an anxious moment. 

 Like parachutists, they often fling themselves free, trusting 

 to the help of the air to spread out their supporting mem- 

 branes ; and there is often an interval of doubt whether the 

 creature's wings are going to sustain it, or whether it will 

 bump down on the ground. At midsummer in the thickets 

 it is very pretty to watch the life of the little golden green 

 beetles which abound in the grass and on the sprays of 

 foliage. Their colour and the neatness of their shape make 

 every movement attractive, and these adventures as they sail 

 and crawl from leaf to leaf are numerous and complicated. 



Even the water-beetles can fly well enough when they 

 wish to shift their quarters to other streams, though normally 

 they spend all their stages of growth in the same dike. 

 They are among the most voracious of the flesh-eating 

 beetles, and devour tadpoles, and any other water-creature 

 that they can catch. The water-boatmen which scull their 

 way to the surface of ponds and dart down again after 

 apparently taking a good look at the intruder are not beetles, 



