March 27, 1885.] 



KNOWLEDGE ♦ 



253 



the end of a matt<>r," to heal the wound. The blood was 

 staunched by a charm ; the prayer was answered, and the 

 "old and steadfast" wooer made well again. On ioachin_<» 

 Wainola, he tr>ld Ilnr.triuca all that had happened, and 

 askrd him to aid his suit hy /oiyltig (so says a later ver- 

 sion) the Sampo, or, according to another account, told 

 him he c^uld huve the reii stockinged girl himself fur his 

 pains. But llmarinen was a uiitoganiist, and declared 

 that, even if he wanted a wife, he would not go to the 

 dreary Northland for one. The artful W'diniimoinen then 

 caused a tir-tree to rise heaven-bigh from the earth, .ind 

 encouraged Ilmarinen's desire to climb it that he might 

 touch the moon. Having thus got his brother " up a tree," 

 Wainatnoinen raised a hurricane which uprooted the tree 

 and carried it with llmarinen to Pohj.da. There, after 

 repeated failures, he succeeded in m^ikingthe Sampo, which 

 Louhi then hid in a copper mountain behind nine locks 

 and bolts. But the daughter would not wed him, pleading 

 that she could not leave Pohjola, whereupon llmarinen 

 returned to Kalevala. 



OUR HOUSEHOLD INSECTS. 



By E. a. Butler. 



THE study of insect life is so essentially a matter of out- 

 door work, that those to whom few opportunities of 

 country rambles occur, and whose sole change of air and 

 scene is from the home to the office, workshop, or factory, 

 are tempted to throw the matter over without consideration 

 as hopeless. And yet this need not altogether be the c.se, 

 for, as we hope to show in the present series of paper.", 

 there is considerable scope for entomological researches 

 even within the four walls of a house. Man is accom- 

 panied in his migrations, not merely by what are familiarly 

 known as the " domestic animals," but also by hosts of 

 insects, which find improved means of subsistence by 

 linking their fortunes with his, and which, though often 

 causing him infinite annoyance, sometimes render con- 

 siderable, though generally unrecognised and unappreciated, 

 services. In their persistent accompaniment of their lord 

 and master, some have travelled over vast areas of 

 land and sea, getting free passages in all the 

 navies of the world, and we in this country owe 

 several of our commonest insects to our commerce with 

 foreign nations. It is " cupboard love " that impels in- 

 sects to accompany man ; they follow him for what they 

 can get; his food they pilfer; his heirlooms they destroy ; 

 his house, his furniture, his clothes, they attack ; and even 

 his very person is not held sacred, especially if he himself 

 to sins against nature as to violate the laws of cleanliness 

 and health. So, not an abode can be found — whether of 

 the most degraded barbarian on the one hand, or of the 

 very cream of civilised Eociety on the other — which can 

 boast of immunity from the intrusion of representatives of 

 this immense horde of living creatures, a class whose 

 species far outnumber those of all other sections of the 

 animal kingdom, having been estimated even at over 

 150,000. That some of this vast host should have special 

 relations to mankind is not to be wondered at, when we 

 remember that two of the chief functions of insect life in 

 the world seem to be the repression of superabundant 

 vegetation, and the removal of effete and waste matters ; 

 for while man in his agricultural capacity bids mother 

 earth bring forth the "herb yielding seed after his kind," 

 more and more abundantly, he often finds a serious check 

 to his efforts in the mighty hosts of insects which 

 the very success of his agricultural operations has 

 been the means of vaotly increasing; and, again, while 



in his constructive and manufacturing capacity he is 

 busily engaged iu converting natural products of the 

 animal and vegetable worlds into things suitablt; for his 

 own use, he thereby attracts the scavenger hosts, who, 

 evidently regarding his accumulations of manufactured 

 articles as so much lumber to be got rid of as quickly as 

 may be, set to work in his cherishi'd hoards with right 

 good will, and tax all his ingenuity to save them from 

 ruin. So it comes to pass tliat th( ro are many sjiecies of 

 insects that more or less permanently take up their abode 

 with us, either actually in our houses and outbuildings, or 

 in our cultivated lands, and depend in large degree upon 

 us and our belongings for their support. It is only with 

 the former of these groups tliat we propose at pre-ent to 

 deal, but we shall find in them good representatives of 

 insect life in general ; in fact, there is not a single important 

 order uureprtsentcd in domestic entomology. BvginDing 

 with the highest, we turn our attention fir.-t to the 



COLEOPTERA, OR BEETLES. 



Of these, a considerable variety make our houses their 

 foraging quarters, and one of the most important sections 

 is that of the " wood-borers." These often commit great 

 depredations in the beams and other woodwork u.'ied in the 

 framework of houses, as well as in articles of furniture, 

 producing I he result known as "worm-eaten." Formerly, 

 their ravagos were more considerable than at the present 

 day, owing to the then more extensive use of timber (and 

 especially un|iainted timber) in building construction. The 

 external indications of the presence of tlicse destructive 

 insects are usually two-fold; small circular peiforations in 

 the surface of the wood, and little heaps of yellow dust on 

 the ground beneath them. The perforations are the en- 

 trances to, or rather exits from, long cylindrical tunnels 

 traversing the wood in various directions (generally in that 

 of its length), and often to so great an extent as to leave 

 only the narrowest of partitions between them, and so 

 reduce the whole interior to a mere network, which is so 

 fragile as to crumble away on the slightest touch, while the 

 outside still remains intnct except for the few perforations, 

 and gives the wood the appearance of being almo.st as 

 sound as when first put up. The beetles themselves are 

 not so often seen, as they spend a large proportion of their 

 life in their burrows. Their ravages are similar iu result 

 to those of the ship worm upon submerged timber, though 

 the latter animal belongs to the Mollusca, and is a relative 

 of such animals as the mussel, oyster, &c. 



&T?r^i— -3^^'i 



Fig. 1. — Auobium Domeeticnm. 



Several species of beetles are answerable for these 

 damages; the commonest is a small cylindrical insect 

 called Anohium domeslicaia (Fig. 1). It is scarcely ,Uh 

 of an iuch long, of a dark brown colour, anJ, like most of 

 its allies, has the head much sunk in the thorax, which 

 is raised behind into a protuberance in such a way as to 

 cans" it to resemble a hood or cowl ; when viewed sideways 

 this has a most quaint appear.'tnce, and irresistibly reminds 

 one of a coal-scuttle bonnet, almost entirely enveloping 

 the head. The elytra, or wing-covers, are marked with 

 narrow jiarallel longitudinal furrows, and are covered with 

 short, soft hairs, termed collectively " pubescence " ; under 

 them are folded a pair of large-sized wings. The legs are of 

 moderate length, but can be closely packed away under the 

 body, when the insect looks like a mere cylindrical pellet 



