May 1, 18G5.J 



SCIENCE-GOSSIP. 



99 



his hind feet, he turns from east to loest, and, turning 

 himself towards the east, he imitates the motions of 

 the world. Having thus rolled the ball, he puts it 

 in the ground, and leaves it there twenty-eight days, 

 which is the time that the moon- passes through the 

 signs of the zodiack, and during that time he 

 hatches the little hectles in the ball ; and the twenty- 

 ninth day, which is the day of the conjunction of 

 the moon with the sun, and the time productions 

 are made in nature, this little animal rolls its ball 

 into the water, where it opens, and the beetles get out. 

 It is upon this account, some say, that it is made the 

 emblem of birth and the symbol of fathers, because 

 these insects have but one father, and no mother. 

 They represent all the world, because of the ball which 

 ' they form and tmm round ; and man, because there 

 are none but male beetles. They are of several 

 kinds, but those for which the Egyptians have tbe 

 greatest veneration are such as have a head like a 

 cat, accompanied with rays, which gives occasion to 

 them to believe that these animals have some 

 analogy to the sun ; and the more because this 

 insect has thirty little paws, made like fingers, 

 which represent the thirty days that the sun makes 

 each month in passing through the signs of the 

 zodiach" 



Tills description is so unique that little remains 

 to be said. Yf e need not remind our readers that 

 it is rather a fanciful sketch, but the pictures and 

 figures, of which we are promised photographs from 

 the hitherto darkened tombs, by means of the new 

 magnesium light, fully justify the poetical remarks 

 we have quoted. In the burial-place of Eamesis VII. 

 near Thebes was recently seen a gigantic scarabeeus 

 about three feet in height, standing erect on its 

 huge hind legs, painted on the walls, while Ham, 

 Noah's second son, the supposed founder of the 

 kingdom, is drawing a red fluid, representing blood 

 or life, from one of its fore legs (!), and is humbly 

 prostrate during the operation. Here is the symbol 

 of life-giving, which afterwards led to the animal's 

 being worshipped as the source of existence. " I have 

 frequently seen," says a friend, "huge figures of the 

 beetle in the tombs of Egypt in the centre of an 

 ark, having a god on either side as inferior at- 

 tendants ; " indeed, in later Egyptian times, so. 

 highly was this ofPensive insect admired that the 

 honours of embalmment were bestowed upon it, and 

 preserved specimens are to be seen at Thebes ; whilst 

 purely executed scarabseidss upon rare stones are not 

 unfrequently found in human mummy cases as 

 having been bmied with their owners. Like many 

 of the other tribes of coleopterous insects, they 

 possess extraordinary muscular power, and a large 

 wine-glass recently placed over a living beetle soon 

 found its way to the remote end of the table. The 

 work of the insect is just that of an ordinary 

 scavenger, subordinating its affection for its young 



to its work, and clearing away, in companies of 

 several hundreds, camel or buffalo dung, and forming 

 with the pellets a nidus for its eggs, as may be 

 observed in this country with beetles of a less pre- 

 tending character, but second cousins to our scara- 

 baeidean friend: standing on their fore-legs, their 

 motto appears to be that which we earnestly recom- 

 mend to our amateur friends in the study of natural 

 history, "nil desperandum;" for the most untiring 

 energy is displayed in rolling their dung-pellets, 

 with their hind legs into a suitable locahty for the 

 preservation of their offspring. And another pretty 

 lesson may indeed be learned from so humble a 

 creature in another branch of "social science," 

 namely, connubial harmony in a division of labour ; 

 for should a hiU- lie between the object of their 

 search and their pellets, the male and female, like 

 the buryiug-beetles, work together, forcing it up the 

 incline every time it rolls to the bottom until the 

 object is accomplished. The scarabseidEe form a 

 very extensive group of the order Coleoptera, con- 

 taining probably 3,000 species. The antenna are 

 more club-shaped than our cockchafer; the legs, 

 like those of the mole crickets, are peculiarly suited 

 to their work, representing ornamental trowels, the 

 feet and tibia of the fore-legs more particularly. It 

 is said that with this scanty supply of tools in the 

 Egyptian desert the egg-ball is first made from a 

 mixture of sand or clay and camel's dung, the rolling 

 process occupying a whole day, with the object ap- 

 parently of drying the material, the dung affording 

 a banquet to the larvae when hatched : this inference 

 is based upon the fact of their leaving off work if 

 the weather be cloudy, or at sunset, commencing 

 with sunrise, which custom probably gave rise to the 

 ancient idea of a symbol of the measure of time. A 

 colossal scarabseus, sacred to the deity Tore, or 

 Cheper, and at a later period, the emblem of the 

 world, formmg part of the Elgin collection from 

 Constantinople, may be seen amongst the Egyptian 

 antiquities at the British Museum. 



J. C. 



In a recent communication to the British Meteoro 

 logical Society, Mr. Glaisher stated, as a result of 

 an elaborate inquiry, that our climate dui'ing the 

 last hundred years had altered — that, in fact, the 

 temperature of the year is two degrees warmer now 

 than it was then ; the temperature of the month of 

 January has increased still more, and the winter 

 months are aU much warmer. — Overland Mail. 



"What is it that constitutes and makes man what 

 he is ? What is it but his power of language — that 

 language giving him the means of recording his 

 experience — making every generation somewhat 

 wiser than its predecessor, more in accordance with 

 the established order of the universe ? — Huxley s 

 Origin of Species. 



