108 
FEARFUL CONTEST IN AN OMNIBUS. 
[Nature and Art, September 1, 1806. 
“ Do you know what they are?” said my fellow- 
passenger, who may as well be called Lens, for 
the sake of brevity ; “ do you know what they are ?” 
he repeated. 
“ Of course I do,” I replied ; and was about to 
explain, but the increasing vigour of the combat 
prevented me from saying more at the moment. 
“ Scale armour against plate ! ” cried Lens. “Scale 
armour has it ! Bravo ! bravo ! You’ll excuse my 
partiality as an umpire,” said he, turning to my side 
of the omnibus, “but I am a Lepidopterist.” 
The lady looked anxiously and inquiringly to- 
wards me, seeming to say, “ Is he not rather a 
Bedlamite? anti will you not protect me, or call out 
to the conductor?” 
“ Do not alarm yourself,” I interposed ; “ it is 
only a very curious conflict that is going on upon 
the floor of the omnibus.” 
“ I can see nothing,” said my companion in the 
pretty bonnet with increasing alarm, and evidently 
thinking that both her travelling companions might 
be in collusion with the Davenport Brothers, or 
perhaps were those celebrated spiritualists in propria 
persona , and that the combatants, if any, were but 
thin air, and visible only to “ mediums” such as we 
might be, or to those under a similar kind of 
O 7 
influence. 
“Allow me to explain,” said Lens, who now 
perceived her alarm and incredulity, “allow me to 
explain. A very singular duel is being fought in 
this vehicle, between ” 
“ Between?” inquired the lady, who may as well 
be called Pretty Bonnet, with an incredulous and 
slightly scornful air. 
“Between a moth and a beetle,” said I, inter- 
rupting my opposite neighbour. 
“ Absurd ! nonsense !” exclaimed Pretty Bonnet ; 
but yet, as she looked towards the exact spot so 
accurately indicated by Lens, she too perceived that 
a battle — an actual battle, fierce and fatal — was 
going on, and became from that moment an equally 
absorbed spectator of the contest. 
We were near the top of Baker Street. The 
omnibus was going at a brisk rate ; and, what with 
the jolting motion of the vehicle and their own 
energetic efforts for victory, the tiny gladiators 
often leapt from the floor in the full tide of the 
relentless strife — falling together, still in the grip 
of a combat cl Voutrance, and renewing the straggle 
in some new position, with ever- varying advantage, 
sometimes to the one and sometimes to the other 
side. 
The moth at length became permanently upper- 
most ; and his long, sharp palpi appeared to be 
fixed, with murderous intent, between the head 
and thorax of the beetle. He seemed to have 
found out a joint in the plate armour of his 
adversary, and was pursuing his advantage with 
deadly effect. 
“ Bravo, Scales !” cried Lens again. “A hearty 
Lepidopterist is cheering you on,” he continued. 
“ Do you know the moth ?” he said, turning to me. 
“No, not exactly ; but it appears to be a 
Crambus.” 
“So I thought, at first,” said Lens; “I thought 
it was Crambus petrijicellus, the ‘ common veneer,’ 
as collectors call it ; but look at the long, sharp 
palpi that he is driving into the flesh of the beetle 
at a weak point of his armour, the joint of the 
thorax. Those are undoubtedly the palpi of a 
Cliilo. I believe it to be Chilo phragmatellus , the 
gigantic veneer ; nearly allied to the Crambidse, it 
is true, but not a Crambus.” 
The size of the insect, I agreed, and the form of 
the wings, as well as the length of the palpi, seemed 
to bear out his view ; “ but then,” I observed, 
“ Chilo phragmatellus is only found at Whittlesea 
Mere.” 
“ True, very true— you are quite right ; and he 
could not have come all the way to London by 
omnibus ; yet I believe it to be the Whittlesea 
Chilo. It is just the season for that rare insect — - 
mid- J une ” 
Here he was interrupted by an intensified state 
of the combat ; the dust flew up around the belli- 
gerents, and the motion of the omnibus, now cross- 
ing the New Road and jolting its hardest, gave new 
variety and spirit to the fight. 
“ But,” said Pretty Bonnet, “ I never knew that 
moths were savage, pugnacious creatures.” 
“ Nor, indeed, did I,” said Lens ; “ but the per- 
tinacity of modern observation is every day lighting 
up new beacons on the road to true science. Who, 
for instance, till Mr. Gould’s persevering investiga- 
tions proved the fact, would have believed that a 
tribe of Australian birds actually constructed 
pleasure-bowers, as a kind of decorative and archi- 
tectural bel respiro, quite distinct from their nests ? 
Till the positive discovery was made, the picturesque 
architecture of the bower-bird would have been 
treated as a fable. And so with the now-evident 
combative propensity of moths. Who, that had not 
witnessed this interesting and spirited contest, 
would for a moment have believed in it ? or in the 
muscular strength of a slender moth like the little 
Chilo that is now fighting so fiercely before our 
eyes? And then,” he continued, “we seem to be 
learning, at the same time, the true functions of tlfe 
palpi, which, as their name denotes, have been 
hitherto considered mere 4 feelers,’ while the present 
contest seems to prove to us that they are positive 
mandibles, weapons offensive and defensive, of a 
truly formidable character. But see — see — the 
beetle has wrenched himself away from their grasp, 
and freed his throat. Now the chances are again 
even. Beware, Scale-armour ! plate and corslet 
may still prove too much for you ; ” and then 
