The Glow-Worm and' Other Beetles 



terials for the work been lacking in either 

 case. 



Nothing, not the scarcity of provisions, 

 nor the climate, nor the reversed seasons, 

 would explain this strange divergence. We 

 must perforce regard it as a matter of ori- 

 ginal specialities, of tastes not acquired but 

 prescribed from the beginning. And what 

 prescribed them was anything but the struct- 

 ure. 



I would defy the greatest expert to tell me, 

 simply from the insect's appearance and 

 without learning the facts by experiment, 

 the manner of industry to which Phanaus 

 Milon, for instance, devotes himself. Re- 

 membering the Onites, who are very similar 

 in shape and who manipulate stercoral mat- 

 ter, he would look upon the foreigner as 

 another manipulator of dung. He would 

 be mistaken : the analysis of the meat-pie has 

 told us so. 



The shape does not make the real Dung- 

 beetle. I have in my collection a magnificent 

 insect from Cayenne, known to the no- 

 menclators as Phanaus festivus, a brilliant 

 Beetle in festive attire, charming, beautiful, 

 glorious to behold. How well he deserves 

 his name ! His colouring is a metallic red, 

 which flashes with the fire of rubies; and he 

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