FOOD OF INSECTS. 



329 



been observed to swallow drops of dew ; and one of them 

 (Odonestis potatoria), which (according to Groedart) after 

 drinking lifts up its head like a hen, has received its name 

 from this circumstance. That it is not the mere want of suc- 

 culency in the food which induces the necessity of drink is 

 plain from those larvas which live entirely on substances so 

 dry that it is almost unaccountable whence the juices of their 

 body are derived. The grub of an Anohium will feed for 

 months upon a chair that has been baking before the fire for 

 half a century, and from which even the chemist's retort could 

 scarcely extract a drop of moisture ; and will yet have its body 

 as well filled with fluids as that of a leaf-fed caterpillar. 



By far the greater part of insects always feed themselves. 

 The young, however, of those w^hich live in societies, as the 

 hive and humble-bees, wasps, ants, &c., are fed by the older 

 inhabitants of the community, which also frequently feed each 

 other. Many of these last insects are distinguished from the 

 majority of their race, which live from day to day and take 

 no thought for the morrow, by the circumstance of storing 

 - up food. Of those which feed themselves, the larger propor- 

 tion have imposed upon them the task of providing for their 

 own wants ; but the tribe of Spheges, wild bees, and some 

 others, are furnished in the larva state by the parent insect 

 with a supply of food sufficient for their consumption until 

 they have attained maturity. 



As to their time of feeding, insects may be divided into 

 three great classes; the day-feeders, the night-feeders, and 

 those which feed indifferently at all times. You have been 

 apt to think, I dare say, that when the sun's warmer beams 

 have waked the insect youth, and 



" Ten thousand forms, ten thousand difFerent tribes, 

 People the blaze," 



you see before you the whole insect world. You are not 

 ^ aware that a host as numerous shun the glare of day, and, like 



the votaries of fashion, rise not from their couch until their 

 more vulgar brethren have retired to rest. While the painted 

 butterfly, the " fervent bees," and the quivering nations (I)f 

 flies, which sport 



" Thick in yon r.tream of light, a thousand ways. 

 Upward and downward thwarting and convolved," _j 



