4 MANDIBULATA. — COLEOPTERA. 



cliilopodlfoi-mes. They voraciously devour worms and the larvae 

 of all other insects, as well as perfect insects ; though the larvae of 

 Zabrus gibbus are said to destroy young wheat, and a long account 

 of their devastations, in the canton of Seeburg, near Halle in Ger- 

 many, is given in the first volume of Germar's Magazine der En- 

 tomologie, wherein it is stated that they were accompanied with a 

 large proportion of the herbivorous larvae of Melolontha ruficornis*. 

 When ready to effect their metamorphoses they construct an oval 

 cell under ground, and change therein to a pupa, in which state 

 they remain about three weeks. 



The perfect insects live either on the ground, or in the water; 

 the former constitute the 



Subsection Geodephaga, Mac T.eay. 



Whose characters^ as laid down by him, are: legs formed for running; the 

 hinder capable of horizontal and vertical motions, and the pectoral lamina 

 into which they are inserted being of moderate size: the hoSy oblong, or 

 ovate: — to which may be added, antennce fiUform, or setaceous: internal 

 maxillary palpi with two joints, exteriial with four: labial palpi vfixh. ^hree 

 or four joints: tarsi invariably with five articulations: the hinder thighs 

 furnished with appendages at the base, termed trochanters. 



The individuals of this extensive group in their perfect state are 

 fully as rapacious as their larvae, and they feed indiscriminately 

 upon all other insects, and their larvae, which they can overpower : 

 thus, being extremely beneficial in the economy of nature, by 

 diminishing the numbers of noxious species, and forcibly exempli- 

 fying the superintendency of Divine Providence over the interests 

 of mankind. They lurk beneath stones, clods of earth, or the 

 refuse materials of gardens, fields, &c. ; the rejectamenta of the 

 ocean and rivers. Most of the species undergo their final meta- 

 morphoses in the autumn ; hybernate in plenty beneath mosses, 

 under the bark of trees, &c. and appear abundantly in the spring 

 and early summer months, when they may be frequently observed 

 running in pathways and roads in search of their prey ; whence 

 they have obtained the appellation of ground-heetlcs : nearly 400 

 species occur in this country, which may be subdivided into the 

 following apparently natural families : 



* May not these herbivorous larvit have been the principal cause of the mis- 

 chief to the wheat, while those of the Zabrus contributed rather to lessen their 

 nximbers than to destroy the corn ? 



