Common Beetles of our Countryside 



discover, than the easier and more obvious pathway will 

 ever afford. 



Very often, as we did when we explored the moors, 

 we cannot do better than follow the brook which, 

 issuing from some glacier excavated tarn, llyn or 

 loch high up under the final peak, winds its circuitous 

 way from one level to another until it reaches the 

 point whence our ascent begins. Of course, during the 

 first part of the journey we shall traverse a region 

 quite similar to that of the moorlands, and meet with 

 the same species of beetles' species which we need 

 not recapitulate ; but there will be others, since the time 

 of year is different, and of course as we rise beyond 

 the 2,000 feet level a more strictly mountain fauna 

 will begin to be apparent. Indeed, before we have 

 got very far up the first grassy rock-strewn slopes 

 we shall certainly notice a rather large beetle either 

 sitting on a stone or crawling up a grass stalk ; or else, 

 if sunshine prevails, flying about with swift bee-like 

 directness, and dropping suddenly among the herbage. 

 If we can manage to catch a few of these beetles we shall 

 see that they have the long narrow shape, the hard, 

 shelly elytra, and the power of jumping if placed upon 

 their backs which characterise the sub-group Sternoxi, 

 (see Fig 19, Plate I.) But here there seem to be two 

 species both the same size (12 to 14 mm.) ; one being 

 a shining dark purple, sometimes with a greenish 

 reflection, the other having only the head, thorax, a spot 

 on the shoulders, and apex of elytra so coloured, the 

 remainder of the elytra being yellow-brown with lines 



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