9 8 



COLEOPTERA. 



The Snout Beetles (Rhyncophora}* at once recognizable by the shape 

 of their head, which is prolonged into a sort of snout or proboscis, upon which 

 are placed the antennas. Their larvae resemble soft little white worms, fur- 

 nished with a scaly head, but quite destitute of legs. They all devour the dif- 

 ferent parts of vegetables, and some are found only in the interior of fruits or 

 seeds, by destroying which they do immense damage. Their nymphs are 

 enclosed in a cocoon. But even in their perfect state some of these beetles are 

 very destructive when they are at all numerous. 



The "Weevils (Bru-chus^ft are tiny authors of incalculable mischief. The 

 females deposit their eggs in the buds, yet young and tender, of our most 

 useful vegetables, in nascent grains of corn, in the flowers of the palm-tree and 

 the coffee-plant. In such situations the larva? are hatched, and find abundant 

 food stored up around them. Having completed their metamorphoses, the 

 perfect insects eat their way out of their vegetable prison, leaving behind them 

 those round holes so often seen in peas or grains of wheat. One well-known 

 species only lives in nuts, where it devours the kernel, converting the interior 

 into a mass of bitterness. Another lives in cork, filling the galleries which it 

 excavates with an equally bitter substance, and this it is which gives the bitter 

 disagreeable flavour to " corked " wine. Many species, such as 



FIG. 87. STAG-HORNED PRIONUS AND DIAMOND BEETLE. 



The Diamond Beetles (Circulid), are gorgeously apparelled, as is abun- 

 dantly indicated by the names with which they are honoured. " Imperial," 

 " royal," " sumptuous," are the humblest epithets appropriate to their magnifi- 

 cence. Diamonds and pearls, emeralds and rubies, gold and sparkling gems, 

 look paltry when compared with their elaborate bedizenment. In the Brazils, 



> rhynchos, a snout; 06/ooj, plioros, carrying, f Having crooked snouts. 



