286 DIVISION III. ARTICULATED ANIMALS.—CLASS IV. INSECTA. 
the splendor of this light by means of membranes, which it superposes, like 
screens, in front of the phosphorescent bumps which it has on its thorax. 
In the Indies, and in China, the women use for dressing their hair, or as 
ear-rings, another Coleopteron of the same tribe, which begins even to be 
employed for this purpose by the women of the south of France. It is a 
Buprestis, of splendid colors, and of metallic brightness. 
In the fourth division of this order, we find the singular genus 
Necrornorus. — These insects derive their generic name from the pecu- 
liar habit they have of burying small animals. They are sometimes called 
Sextons, Burying Beetles, and Undertakers. When they have discovered a 
dead mouse or mole, they creep beneath it, and dig away the earth until a 
grave, sufficiently large to receive the body, has been excavated, when they 
place the carcass therein, after having deposited their eggs within it; their 
larvee feed on the decaying body. All the species have a strong smell of 
musk. Their power of scent is extraordinary ; they smell the dead nearly 
as soon as killed, from an immense distance, and hasten to perform their 
funeral rites. 
As the fifth family presents no prominent characteristics, we pass on to 
the sixth division, which contains the great and interesting groups Scara- 
beus, Melolontha, and Cetonia. 
Scanab.1us.— This genus is composed of species peculiar to the Old 
World. They have a rounded body, depressed above, with antennx, nine- 
jointed, and with a leaf-like club. They enclose their eggs in balls of 
excrement, like large pills, — whence they are called Pill-makers, — which 
they roll along with their hind feet until they reach the hole where they are 
to be deposited. In this labor they often work in company. 
S. Sacer. — This species and one other were known to and worshipped 
by the ancient Egyptians, who introduced them into their hieroglyphical 
writings. Their effigies are represented on all the monuments, and models 
of them, executed in the most precious materials, were worn as amulets around 
the neck. 
MetorontiA.— The most commonly known insect of this genus is the 
Cock-chafer. The French word for Cock-chafer, ZZanneton, according to 
M. Mulsant, comes from the Latin Al’tonus (sonorous wings), which first 
became Halleton. Linneus gave these insects first the name of Melolontha, 
which they probably had among the Greeks, and which seems to be the case 
from this passage in Aristophanes, in his comedy of “The Clouds :” “ Let 
your spirit soar; let it fly whither it lists, like the Melolontha tied with a 
thread by the leg.” We see that the habit of martyrizing Cock-chafers is. of 
