INSECTS. 
170 
Omnipotent Creator. The word is used by naturalists in a 
technical sense, to express the degree in which we find those 
peculiarities developed that constitute any particular group. 
Those peculiarities of structure, for example, that make an 
Insect what it is, and not a Worm or a Crustacean, are 
found to be present in the greatest intensity, and in the 
fullest combination, in the group of Beetles, and hence we 
say that these are the most perfect of their class. A Beetle 
is not more perfect as an animal than any other, but it is 
a more perfect insect, or rather, more perfectly an insect. 
You may very readily identify a Beetle by its mouth 
being armed by two pairs of forceps-like jaws, and by its 
fore-wings being hardened into leathery sheaths for the 
hinder wings, and meeting in a straight line down the 
centre. The technical name Coleopteba, or Sheath-wings, 
expresses the latter character in Greek. 
Many species of this group are pre-eminent for beanty 
of colour, especially the many-coloured refulgence of bur- 
nished metal, as in tho Buprestidce, and the Cetoniadice, and 
the Eumolpidce, and others ; and the lustre of the richest 
precious stones, as in many of the Diamond-beetles and 
others of the Curculionidm, whoso wing-sheaths under a 
lens look as if they were dusted with pounded gems. 
Tho Glow-worm, that lights our hedge-banks with its 
feeble spark in the soft summer nights of July, is a Beetle, 
and so is the Firefly of the West Indies, that carries a 
pair of flaming lamps upon his back. The pretty scarlet 
Lady-bird, that appears to have had a “ favourable erup- 
tion ” of black buttons, is a little Beetle that every child 
knows and loves ; and the dreadful Death-watch, that 
scratched the doom of our great-grandmothers on their 
