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THE WEEVILS AND THE MUSK BEETLE. 



The Oil Beetle {Meloe vioiaceus). 



below the thorax. The oily matter that is poured from the joints is 

 considered in some countries to be a specific for rheumatism, and is 

 expressed from the insect for medicinal purposes. The color of the 

 Oil Beetle is dull indigo-blue. 



We now arrive at a vast group of beetles, embracing several thou- 

 sand speci?s, which are popularly classed under the name of Weevils, 



and may all be known by 

 the peculiar shape and very 

 elongated snouts. Many of 

 these creatures have their 

 elytra covered with minute 

 but most brilliant scales, 

 arranged in rows, and pre- 

 senting, when placed under 

 the microscope, a specta- 

 cle almost unapproached in 

 splendor. They are mostly 

 slow in their movements, not quick of foot, and many are wholly 

 wingless. 



The most brilliant of the Weevils are to be found in the typical fam- 

 ily Curculionidse, to which belong the well-known Diamond Beetles, in 

 such request as objects for the microscope. 



The maggots that are so frequently found in nuts, and which leave 

 so black and bitter a deposit behind them that the person who has un- 

 fortunately tasted a maggot-eaten nut is forcibly reminded of the Dead 

 Sea apple with its inviting exterior and bitter dusty contents, also be- 

 long to the Weevils, and are the larvse of the Nut Weevil {Balayiinus 

 nucumy All the members of the genus are remarkable for the extra- 

 ordinary length of the snout, at the extremity of which are placed the 

 small but powerful jaws. 



We now come to the Longicorn Beetles, so called on account of the 

 extraordinary length of the antennae in many of the species. These in- 

 sects are well represented in England by many species, the best known 

 being the common Musk Beetle. 



The beautiful beetles of which the common Musk Beetle is an excel- 

 lent example vary considerably in size, some being several inches in 

 length, while some are hardly one quarter of an inch long. The ex- 

 treme length of their antennae is the most conspicuous property, and by 

 that peculiarity they are at once recognized. 



A small moth, Adela de Geerella, possesses the same peculiarity. 

 The length of the moth is about a quarter of an inch, and the length 

 of the antennae more than an inch and a half. The antennae wave about 

 with every breath of air, as if the insect had become entangled in a spi- 

 der's web and escaped with some of the loose threads floating about it. 



