THE BURYING BEETLE. 
93 
it on a soft spot of ground. I was about to add the frog to the 
number of objects for sepulture, but have omitted that creature 
because the porous nature of its skin causes it to dry up so 
rapidly, that the beetle will seldom take the trouble of bury- 
ing it. 
Sometimes, but very rarely, a pair of the beetles will come to 
the bait by daylight, their wide wings bearing them along with 
great speed ; but in general they prefer night as the time to 
begin their work. If the bird be visited early in the morning, 
it will be no longer upon the surface of the ground, but will be 
half sunk below it, as though the earth had given way, just as 
a piece of dark cloth sinks into snow. If, however, the bird be 
removed, the cause of its gradual disappearance will be seen in 
the form of one or two beetles, sometimes black, and sometimes 
beautifully barred with orange. Then let the bird be replaced, 
and a trowel carefully introduced under it, so that the bird and 
beetles can be gently transferred to a vessel of earth and covered 
with a glass shade. 
During the day, the beetles will mostly remain quiet ; but in 
the evening they begin to be active. To dig a hole, and -then to 
drag the bird into it, would be a task far beyond their powers, 
and they therefore employ another plan. They entirely burrow 
beneath the bird, emerging every now and then to scrape out 
the loose soil, walk round the bird, mount it as if to see how the 
work is proceeding, and then disappear afresh and renew their 
labours. Sometimes they dig rather too much on one side, and 
then they appear sadly puzzled, running round and round the 
bird, getting on it as if to press it down with their weight, pulling 
it this way and that way ; and at last they do what they ought 
to have done at first, namely, disappear under the bird and 
scrape away the earth until the hole is large enough to allow 
the bird to sink into the required position. 
The beetle just mentioned conveys into its burrow the whole 
of the substance on which the grub is intended to feed; but 
those which we shall now examine select only a portion for that 
purpose. There is a very large tribe of beetles, of which the 
