CHAPTER II 

 THE SACRED BEETLE 



I 

 THE BALL 



IT is six or seven thousand years since the Sacred Beetle 

 was first talked about. The peasant of ancient Egypt, 

 as he watered his patch of onions in the spring, would see 

 from time to time a fat black insect pass close by, 

 hurriedly trundling a ball backwards. He would watch the 

 queer rolling thing in amazement, as the peasant of Provence 

 watches it to this day. 



The early Egyptians fancied that this ball was a symbol of 

 the earth, and that all the Scarab's actions were prompted by 

 the movements of the heavenly bodies. So much knowledge 

 of astronomy in a Beetle seemed to them almost divine, and 

 that is why he is called the Sacred Beetle. They also thought 

 that the ball he rolled on the ground contained the egg, and 

 that the young Beetle came out of it. But as a matter of 

 fact, it is simply his store of food. 



It is not at all nice food. For the work of this Beetle is to 

 scour the filth from the surface of the soil. The ball he rolls 

 so carefully is made of his sweepings from the roads and 



fields. 



This is how he sets about it. The edge of his broad, flat 

 head is notched with six teeth arranged in a semicircle, like 

 a sort of curved rake ; and this he uses for digging and cutting 

 up, for throwing aside the stuff he does not want, and 

 scraping together the food he chooses. His bow-shaped fore- 

 legs are also useful tools, for they are very strong, and they 



