A DUNG-BEETLE OF THE PAMPAS 103 



workman, among Dung-beetles any more than among 

 ourselves. To guide the modeller there is something 

 better than a set of tools : there is what I would call the 

 bump, the genius of the animal. 



Phaneeus Milo laughs at difficulties. He does more : 

 he laughs at our classifications. The word Dung-beetle 

 implies a lover of dung. He sets no value on it, either 

 for his own use or for that of his offspring. What he wants 

 is the sanies of corpses. He is to be found under the 

 carcasses of birds, dogs or cats, in the company of the 

 undertakers-in-ordinary. The gourd of which I give a 

 drawing overleaf was lying in the earth under the remains 

 of an owl. 



Let him who will explain this conjunction of the appe- 

 tites of the Necrophore with the talents of the Scarab. As 

 for me, baffled by tastes which no one would suspect 

 from the mere appearance of the insect, I give it up. 



I know in my neighbourhood one Dung-beetle and one 

 alone who also works among the remains of dead bodies. 

 This is Onthophagus Ovatus (Lin.), a constant frequenter 

 of dead moles and rabbits. But the dwarf undertaker 

 does not on that account scorn stercoraceous fare : he 

 feasts upon it like the other Onthophagi. Perhaps there 

 is a two-fold diet here : the bun for the adult ; the highly- 

 spiced, far-gone meat for the grub. 



Similar facts are encountered elsewhere with different 

 tastes. The predatory Hymenopteron takes her fill of 

 honey drawn from the nectaries of the flowers, but feeds 

 her little ones on game. Game first, then sugar, for the 

 same stomach. How that digestive pouch must change 

 on the road ! And yet no more than our own, which 

 scorns in later life that which delighted it when young. 



Let us now examine the work of Phanaeus Milo 



