196 BARON WALCKENAER ON THE INSECTS 
It appears therefore that the Melolontha Fullo of Pliny should be 
sought for among the Coprides, (Bousiers,) or among the Cetonie, 
and not among the Chafers. 
Pliny says that the green Scarabus possesses the property of ren- 
dering the vision more penetrating, and that engravers upon gems rest 
their eyes by gazing upon these insects. “ Scarabai viridis natura 
contuentium visum exacuit, itaque gemmarum sculptores contuitu eorum 
acquiescunt*.” Marcellus Empiricus, copying Pliny, relates the same 
fact, but he gives us the additional information that this Scarabzeus is of 
the colour of the emerald, “ Scarabeus coloris smaragdini.” This defini- 
tion is exactly suitable to the Cetonia fastuosa, and to the Cetonia 
aurata, particularly to the former. These two species are of a beautiful 
golden or emerald green, but the Cefonia aurata is distinguished from 
the other by white spots upon the elytra (“albis guttis”); it is nine lines 
in length, and is frequently found in gardens, upon roses and other 
flowers. The great Chafer with white spots, the Melolontha Fullo of 
modern naturalists, is, on the contrary, rare, and is found only upon 
downs and in the vicinity of the sea. 
From all these circumstances I conclude that the Cetonia aurata was 
the object of the superstition of which Pliny speaks, and is the insect 
to which he gives the name of Fullo. 
To recapitulate: the word Spondyle, or Sphondyle, in the works of 
Aristotle, denotes the Cockchafer, both the perfect insect and its 
larva. 
As employed by Pliny, who was unacquainted with the metamorphosis 
of the Cockchafer, Spondyle denotes only the larva of this insect, or 
the white worm, taken for a small serpent, which in the time of Agri- 
cola, in the sixteenth century, was still known to the Greeks by this 
_name of Spondyle. 
The “ Scarabeus qui pilas volvit’ of Pliny, which cured the quartan 
ague and was adored by the Egyptians, is the Scarabeus sacer of 
Linneus, the Ateuchus sacer and Ateuchus laticollis of Fabricius, and 
the Ateuchus egyptiacus of Latreille and Caillaud. 
The true Scarabzeus of Horapollo, the wings of which form rays 
when extended, is also the same insect. 
The Sacred Scarabeus, named Cantharis in Aristotle and Aristo- 
phanes, is the Atewchus egyptiacus. 
The “ Scarabeus cui sunt cornicula reflexa” of Pliny is the Ateuchus 
Midas, the Copris Midas, common in Egypt and brought from that 
country by M. Savigny. 
The Scarabzeus with two horns, sacred to the moon, of Horapollo, is 
also the Copris Midas. 
alluded to is still we believe a subject of discussion. See London and Edinburgh 
Philosophical Magazine, vol. iv. p. 170.—Ebir. | 
* Pliny, Hist. Nat., book xxix, chap. 38. yol. viii. p. 270. 
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