THE GARDEN PRIMER 



honesty I suppose we must confess that she does it 

 unconsciously, she nevertheless does it very well, 

 and as nothing else can do it. 



And quite as the patient horse fetches and carries 

 for man from morning until night, the active bee 

 fetches and carries also, performing a service so great 

 and so important that without it only a comparatively 

 small percentage of man's fruit foods would ever be 

 produced at all. She serves while serving her hive to 

 be sure — but we are none the less dependent upon her. 



These two small creatures — the lady-bug and the 

 bee — are examples of the dual service which many of 

 their great group render to the lords of creation — without 

 the lords having anything to do about it. As such 

 examples let us see just what it is that each does. 



The lady-bug, in the first place, is not a bug at all, 

 but a beetle — that is, an insect of the sheath-winged 

 order. These have two pairs of wings, the outer always 

 hard and armor- like, and closing down over the thin 

 and folded membranous under pair. True bugs do 

 not have these sheath wings but only gauzy ones; some 

 indeed are devoid of wings altogether and can only 

 run or crawl about. 



Like most beetles the lady-bug is predaceous — 

 is in other words a preying, carnivorous little savage, 

 who devours with rapacious appetite other insects, her 

 preference for those of the scale class being especially 

 notable. This taste in food is the reason of her value 

 to man; in feeding herself and depositing her eggs 

 where the newly hatched larvae will find their favorite 



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