rd INSECTA. 
body, the variety of forms exhibited in the head and thorax, sexually 
considered, is one of the most beautiful of the order, and frequently 
also ‘as regards the species, which in their perfect state live upon 
vegetable substances, by the splendour of the metallic colours with 
which they are ornamented. Most of the other species, however, 
feeding on decomposed vegetable aliment, such as dung, tan, or ex- 
crementitious matters, are usually of one uniform black or brown 
hue. Some of the Coprophagi, however, do not yield even in this 
respect to the former. They are all furnished with wings, and their 
gait is heavy. E 
The body of the larvee is long, almost semicylindrical, soft, fre- 
quently rugose, whitish, and divided into twelve annuli, with six 
squamous feet; the head is squamous and armed with stout mandi- 
bles. Each side of the body is furnished with nine stigmata; its pos- 
terior extremity is thicker, rounded and almost always doubled under 
it, so that the back being arcuated or convex, the animal cannot ex- 
tend itself in a straight line, crawls badly on a level surface, and falls 
backwards on its side at every instant. An idea of their form may 
be obtained from that of the larva, so well known to gardeners by the 
name of ver blanc, which is that of the Melolontha vulgaris (a). 
Some of them require three or four years to become pup; they 
construct in their place of residence an ovoid shell, or one resembling 
an elongated ball, composed of earth or the debris of substances they 
have gnawed, the particles of which are cemented by a glutinous 
matter produced from their body. Their aliment consists of the dung 
of various animals, mould, tan, and yoots of vegetables, frequently 
such as are necessary to man, of which they sometimes destroy im- 
mense quantities, to the great loss of the cultivator of the soil. The. 
tracheze of these larvee are elastic, while those of the perfect Insect 
are tubular. There is also a remarkable difference in the nervous 
system in these two states. The ganglions are less numerous and 
more closely approximated in the perfect Insect, and the two poste- 
rior ones give off numerous radiating filaments. According to the 
observations of M. Marcel de Serres on the eyes of Insects, those of 
most of the Lamellicornes present peculiar characters, which approxi- 
mate their organization to that of the Tenebrionites, Blatte, and 
other lucifugant Insects. 
The alimentary canal is generally very long, particularly in the 
Coprophagi, and contorted round itself; the chylific ventricle is 
&> (@ Our common grubs, which are so abundant in dung-hill, gardens, &c., 
are larve of various species of Lamellicornes—EneG, Ep. 
