GROUND-BEETLES AND WATER-BEETLES. 



555 



Fig. 25. TIGER- 

 BEETLE (Cicindela, 

 Chinensis, Linn.). 



pitfall for other insects, very much resembling that formed by an ant-lion. 

 The perfect insect is bright green, with white mark- 

 ings, and coppery legs and under-surface. It feeds on 

 other insects, and runs and flies in the sun with great 

 activity. Some of the foreign species are very handsome. 

 Some genera frequent trees. We have figured a large 

 green Chinese species, C. C7miensis(Linn.), with black and 

 white markings. 



In the Carabidce the legs and antennse are less slender, 

 the front tibise being sometimes flattened, and often fur- 

 nished with a conspicuous notch on each side, and the 

 head is smaller and eyes less prominent ; the maxillse 

 have no moveable hook at the tip. They are much more 

 nocturnal in their habits than the tiger-beetles, though 

 many species may be met with by day. The species of the 

 typical genus Carabus (Linn.) are rather large beetles, 

 many of them measuring an inch or more in length. The 

 elytra are well developed, and moveable, but the wings 

 are absent. They are long beetles, of a black or bronzy 

 colour, and some species are beautifully metallic. One of the most con- 

 spicuous of these is the golden-green Carabus auratus (Linn.), a common 

 garden insect abroad, but rare in England, though it is not 

 unfrequently imported with vegetables. Some of the Ground-Beetles. 

 smaller species of this group genus Bembidium, (Latr.), etc. 

 are found in marshy places, though they are not quite aquatic in their habits. 

 We have figured Zabrus gibbus, a blackish insect half an inch long, with red legs 

 and antennse ; which, contrary to the usual habit of the family, 

 is destructive to growing corn, attacking the ears at night. The 

 Bombardier beetles, belonging to the genus Brachinus (Weber), 

 are reddish beetles, about one-third of an inch long, with blue- 

 black elytra, much broader than the thorax. They lurk under 

 stones, and when alarmed, discharge an acid fluid which 

 volatilises into smoke with a slight explosion. 



Among the foreign Carabidce the most remarkable is the 

 fiddler beetle Mormolyce phyllodes (Hagenbach), a reddish-brown 

 beetle, about two inches in length, with very broad elytra. The 

 5US - shape of the beetle is really something like that of a fiddle. It 

 is a native of Java. 



The npxt group, the Hydradephaga, or water-beetles, have the two front 

 pairs of legs near together, and the hinder pair more widely separated, and 

 widened, flattened, and fringed with hair, so as to form a 

 pair of oars. They are divided into two main families, the Carnivorous 

 Dytiscidce. and the Gyrinidce. The species of Dytiscus Water-Beetles. 

 (Linn.) are large smooth or furrowed olive-brown beetles, 

 an inch in length, and nearly half as broad. Their larvse are long white 

 grubs, with very strong jaws, and both the larvse and the beetles are very 

 voracious, destroying great numbers of water-animals, and are even very 

 destructive to fish fry. The beetles quit the water at night and fly about, 

 returning to the water for the day. Sometimes they will dash themselves 

 against a pane of glass, mistaking it for water. There are numerous smaller 

 species of this family, more variegated, in their colours ; but the Gyrinidce^ 

 of which there are only a few species in England, are more likely to attract 



Fig. 26. 



