The Sacred Beetle and Others 



see her working with her forehead and legs 

 in order to spread the matter, crush it and 

 apply it to its earthen sheath seems to me a 

 very difficult thing to do. I abandon the at- 

 tempt and restore the glass to its first posi- 

 tion. 



A little later, I make a second examina- 

 tion, when the mother has left her burrow. 

 The work is now finished. The outward 

 form is that of a thimble fifteen millimetres 

 deep by ten wide.^ The flat end has all the 

 appearance of a lid fitted to the opening and 

 carefully soldered on. The rounded lower 

 half of the thimble is full. This is the grub's 

 larder. Above is the hatching-chamber, with 

 the egg sticking up from the floor, fixed 

 perpendicularly by one end. 



Great is the danger for- the Onlticellus and 

 the Onthophagus, offspring of the dog-days, 

 both of them. Their jar of preserves is 

 greatly restricted in volume. Its shape is in 

 no way calculated to reduce evaporation; It 

 is too near the surface of the soil to escape 

 the dangerous dryness of the air. If the 

 cake should harden, the grub will die, after 

 its abstinence has been prolonged to the ut- 

 most limits of endurance. 



I place in glass tubes, which will represent 



1 .585 X .39 inch. — Translator's Note. 

 256 



