358 INVERTEBRATES. 



as larvae and in a perfect state, choosing as their residence the 

 half decayed and putrid bodies of animals. What is most repul- 

 Bive and disgusting to us, is the most inviting and delightful to 

 them. Their chief enjoyment lies in luxuriating on corruption 

 and death. This furnishes a striking emblem of man estranged 

 from God, avoiding the loveliness of holiness, and wallowing in 

 the putridity of pollution and sin 



The Burting-Beetle. — This curious beetle derires its 

 name from its habit of burying any small dead animal left on the 

 surface of the ground. With such rapidity does it work, that two 

 beetles have been known to cover up a sparrow within a few hours ; 

 and so unwearied are they, that if several Burying-beetles are 

 placed in a vessel filled with earth, and kept constantly supplied 

 with dead frogs, mice, etc., they will continue to bury them as long 

 as the supply is kept up. The object of this remarkable instinct, 

 so beneficial in its effects, is to furnish food for the young who are 

 hatched from eggs laid in the body of the animal during its burial. 

 In this way innumerable carcasses which would pollute the atmo- 

 sphere are removed, and made beneficial to the soil. 



The wing-cases and body of the burying-sylph are black ; 

 the clubs of the antennae are red. The habits and economy of this 

 species of insects are exceedingly striking, and cannot fail deeply 

 to interest the reflecting and inquiring reader. The account is 

 taken from a very intelligent writer on natural history, namely, M. 

 Gleditech ; he was much surprised at seeing moles which were left 

 dead upon the ground suddenly disappear ; he was therefore de- 

 termined to make himself acquainted with the cause of this sin- 

 gular occuirence. On the 25th day of the month of May, he 

 placed a dead mole on the moist, soft earth of his garden ; in two 

 days he found it sunk to the depth of four fingers' breadth into 

 the earth. It was in the same position in which he had placed it, 

 and its grave corresponded exactly with the dimensions of its body, 

 both as to length and breadth. The day following the grave was 

 half filled up : he cautiously drew out the mole, which exhaled 

 the most pestiferous and offensive odor, and found directly under 

 it little holes, in which were four species of the burying-sylph 



