DUNG-BEETLE. 249 



pers, besides the entrails of a fish, and two morsels 

 of the lungs of an ox. In another experiment, a 

 single beetle buried a mole forty times its own bulk 

 and weight in two days."* 



In the summer of 1826, we found on Putney 

 Heath, in Surrey, four of these beetles, hard at work 

 in burying a dead crow, precisely in the manner 

 described by M. Gleditsch.f 



Dung-Beetle. 



A still more common British insect, the Dorr, 

 Clock, or Dung-Beetle (Geotrupes stercorarius) uses 

 different materials for burying along with its eggs. 

 " It digs," to use the words of Kirby and Spence, 

 " a deep cylindrical hole, and carrying down a mass 

 of the dung to the bottom, in it deposits its eggs. 

 And many of the species of the genus Ateuchus roll 

 together wet dung into round pellets, deposit an egg 

 in the midst of each, and when dry push them back- 

 wards by their hind-feet, to holes of the surprising 

 depth of three feet, which they have previously dug 

 for their reception, and which are often several yards 

 distant. The attention of these insects to their eggs 

 is so remarkable, that it was observed in the earliest 

 ages, and is mentioned by ancient writers, but with 

 the addition of many fables, as that they were all of 

 the male sex ; that they became young again every 

 year ; and that they rolled the pellets containing their 

 eggs from sunrise to sunset every day, for twenty- 

 eight days without intermission.''^ 



" We frequently notice in our evening walks," says 

 Mr. Knapp, " the murmuring passage, and are often 

 stricken by the heedless flight of the great dorr- 

 beetle {Geoirupes stercorarius), clocks, as the boys 

 call them. But this evening my attention was called 



* Act. Acad. Beroliu. 1752, et Gleditwh, Pliys. Biitan, 

 quoted bv Kirby and Spence, ii. 353. 



t .1. OL J Moufot. 153 Kirhy and Spence, ii. 350. 



