The Glow-Worm and Other Beetles 



ment, which I took care to stop at the moment 

 when it produced the desired effect, has not 

 been fatal to him; but it has had much more 

 serious consequences for him than for the 

 Geotrupes. The insect more sensitive to the 

 alarm due to concussion or to a fall of tem- 

 perature is also the more sensitive to the ac- 

 tion of ether. 



Thus the enormous difference which I ob- 

 serve in these two insects, with regard to the 

 inertia provoked by a shock or by handling 

 them in one's fingers, is explained by nice 

 differences of impressionability. Whereas 

 the Buprestis remains motionless for nearly 

 an hour, the Geotrupes is struggling vio- 

 lently after a minute or two. And even then 

 I rarely attain this limit. 



In what respect has the Geotrupes, to de- 

 fend itself, less need of the stratagem of 

 simulated death than the Black Buprestis, 

 well protected by his massive build and his 

 armour, which is so hard that it resists the 

 point of a pin and even of a needle? We 

 should be perplexed by the same question in 

 respect of a multitude of insects, some of 

 which remain motionless while others do not; 

 and we could not possibly foresee what 

 would happen from the genus of the subject, 

 its form, or its way of living. 

 386 



