The Life of the Weevil 
taur’ has edified us by his domestic habits. 
Long live the modest! Long live the 
little! 
One of these little ones, smaller than a 
peppercorn, will set us a great problem, full 
of interest but probably insoluble. The offi- 
cial nomenclators call it Cionus thapsus, FAB. 
If you ask me what Cionus means, I shall 
reply frankly that I have not the least idea. 
Neither the writer of these lines nor the 
reader is any the worse off for that. In en- 
tomology a name is all the better for mean- 
ing nothing but the insect named. 
If an amalgam of Greek or Latin has a 
meaning that alludes to the insect’s manner 
of living, the reality is often inconsistent with 
the word, because the nomenclator, work- 
ing in a necropolis, has preceded the obser- 
ver, who is concerned with the living species. 
Moreover, rough guesses and even glaring 
mistakes too often disfigure the records of 
the insect world. 
At thé present moment, it is the word thap- 
sus that deserves reproach, for the plant ex- 
1The essays on Minotaurus Typhaus will appear in 
the next volume of the series, to be entitled More Beetles. 
—Translator’s Note. 
308 
