1875.] 
AMERICAN AGRICULTURIST, 
311 
hammer, and with such force as to cause the bounce. 
From its striking such a blow, the beetle is in some 
parts of the country called the “ Blacksmith,” and those 
ignorant people who believe in signs and omens, say 
that if one of these “ Blacksmiths ” comes into a house, 
there will be a quarrel and the people in it come to blows. 
What nonsense to tell such stuff about an innocent in¬ 
sect. Its most common name is “Click” or “ Spring- 
Beetle.”—“ Where does it come from ? ” you will perhaps 
want to ask, and it is a very proper question. When¬ 
ever you see a perfect insect, always try to find out what 
it formerly was. I think I told you once, and if I did, it 
will bear to be repeated, that there are four stages in the 
life of an insect. The egg, the larva, the pupa, and the 
perfect insect. In beetles and butterflies, and some 
others, the larva is very unlike the perfect insect; the 
larva of the beetle is a grub or maggot, some call them 
worms, and the larva of the butterfly is a caterpillar. In 
the grass-hopper, chinch-bug, and some others, the larva 
is much like the perfect insect, but smaller and without 
wings. So the grubs and caterpillars, when they are 
full grown, make cocoon or chrysalis, and become what 
is called the pupa, which is usually quiet and as if dead ; 
some insects remain in this way all winter. The pupa of 
the grass-hopper, and some others, is quite as lively as the 
larva, and only to be told from it by those who examine 
very closely. These are the changes that you are to look 
for, and if people only knew so much as this about in¬ 
sects, they would be able to destroy the hurtful ones 
much better than they do. 
A gentleman called on me some months ago with a 
great discovery. He had found out the cause of the cot¬ 
ton-worm, which destroys so much cotton in the south¬ 
ern states. He had some cotton-seed which had been 
put away for some years, and in it were many little bee¬ 
tles, or weevils. “ There,” said he, “ that's the cause of 
all the trouble, these things turn into cotton-worms, and 
if you tell them to burn the cotton-seed, and not use it 
for manure, they will have no more cotton-worms.”—I 
could not convince him that these were perfect insects, 
and could not turn into anything. I don’t believe one 
of you would make such a mistake... .Well, to get back 
to our beetle. Its grub is over two inches long when 
full grown; it is reddish-yellow, with a brown head ; it 
usually lives in old apple trees, and feeds upon the wood. 
Perhaps you would like to know about the scientific 
name ; there are several hundreds of these click beetles, 
and the genus to which they belong was named Elater, 
which is a Greek word for leaper, and this one, from its 
eye-like spots, was Elater ocellatus, but there are so 
many, that they have been divided up, and more recent¬ 
ly this goes by the name of Alaus ocellatus _This in¬ 
sect talk is already too long, but I want to say a word 
about some other click-beetles. They are all mu:h 
smaller than this, and often dark-brown, or sometimes 
black. Some of them fly into the house in the evening, to 
get at the light. You can tell them by their click, when 
held, or laid upon their backs. The grubs of some of 
these are among the most destructive insects of the farm 
or garden, and are called “ wire-worms.” Another thing 
which is not a true insect, but a sort of millipede, is 
often but very incorrectly called wire-worm; this has 
more legs than you would like to count, while the true 
wire-worm has only six legs near the bead, and two lit¬ 
tle ones near the tail. The grubs live for several years 
in the ground, and do much mischief... .The celebrated 
fire-fly of the West Indies, or cucvjo (pronounced coo- 
coo-yo), is a close relative of our click-beetles, and 
somewhat larger than the one figured; it is dark-brown, 
and in place of the black eye-like spots, carries two 
bright lanterns. Yes, regular lanterns, with a light in¬ 
side, a light like that you see in the fire-fly or lightning- 
bug, only many times stronger than any fire-fly you ever 
saw, and besides this there is a spot underneath the body 
that gives light. If one of these insects is held quite 
near the paper it gives light enough to allow you to read 
fine print. When I was a boy a friend brought me a lot 
of them in a box from Cuba; I kept them all summer, 
and had a grand time with them.—I can’t now tell you 
more about them, except to mention two curious uses 
the West Indians make of them. They have a very nar¬ 
row waist, so that a thread can be passed between the 
two halves of the body, and they may be tied or har¬ 
nessed without injury. The women fasten them in this 
way into their hair, and upon their dresses, and thus 
make a brilliant display at night. The Indians, when 
they travel at night, tie a cucujo to each great toe, and 
thus are enabled to see where to tread.—So much for 
Click-beetles. The Doctor. 
- — i | i — - 
An Intelligent Cat. 
A writer in an English magazine for '.little folks, tells 
some wonderful stories about his daughter’s cat, 
“ Topsy.” We give you two of them, in the hope it will 
call out some cat stories from our boys and girls. “One 
afternoon Nelly, who is only three years old, being tired 
of playing with her doll, came to mamma to be nursed. 
Mamma took her upon her lap, with the doll in her arms. 
Presently Nelly went to sleep, and let the doll fall; when 
she woke up again, mamma looked down on the hearth¬ 
rug, and saw Topsy lying there nursing Nelly’s doll. He 
had got one of his fore-paws behind dolly’s head, and 
the other one round its waist, and was holding it just as 
he bad seen Nelly do. Perhaps he knew that a doll was 
meant to be nursed, and as Nelly was not doing it, he 
had better try ; at least it seemed like it, don’t you think ? 
“ You know wo had some very cold weather just before 
Christmas. Well, one day when Topsy’s cat’s-meat was 
brought, it was frozen quite hard, and felt as cold as ice. 
Topsy took it up in his mouth, but put it down again 
directly. He shook his head, and said, ‘ Skiff! skiff 1 
skiff ! ’ and it was very clear he did not like it at all. 
What do you think he did then ? He considered for a 
moment, and then took one of the pieces in his mouth 
and carried it over to the fire, he put it down on the hot 
fender for a minute, and then ate it up. When it was 
finished, he went for the second piece, and then for the 
third, both of which he warmed at the fire in the same 
manner. Wasn’t that clever of him ? I think you will 
not be surprised to hear that we are all very fond of out- 
cat, and not a little proud of him, for all I have told you 
is true.” 
A Fortune Made l»y a Wooden Hat. 
In the year 1826 a poor journeyman turner, named 
Muhle, in worn-out shoes, through which his bare toes 
projected, with a knapsack on his weary back, arrived at 
a little village not far from Colmar, in Alsace. In this 
village was an engine-factory, in which our workman 
had come to look for employment. But the poor fellow’s 
ragged, miserable appearance did not tell in his favor, 
and the master of the factory at once sent him about his 
business. Our journeyman turned away, and sadly and 
despondently went out at the door. But he had scarcely 
placed his hat on his head, when from the office within 
he heard the voice of the master calling him back. He 
returned to the factory, and the proprietor asked him— 
“What, in the name of wonder, is that kind of hat 
which you wear!”—“It is my own, and turned out of 
wood!”—“What I a wooden hat? I must examine it a 
little closer. Where did you buy it?”—“I did not buy 
it, I made it myself.”—“ Indeed 1 how and where, then ? ” 
—“On the turning-lathe.”—“But your hat is oval, and 
on the turning-lathe things are made round. Some one 
else must have done that for you, you could not have 
made that hat.”—“Yes, it is as I say,” replied the poor 
journeyman. “I turned that hat myself.”—“And how 
have you made it ? you must be a wonderfully clever fel¬ 
low to make an oval hat on a turning-lathe.”—“ I moved 
the central point, and then turned as it suited me. As I 
have to walk long distances, and can not afford to buy an 
umbrella, I made a hat which would serve me instead.”— 
The manufacturer was struck, for he saw that poor 
Muhle had by himself discovered a difficult problem in 
the art of turning, which in the mechanics of the present 
day has become of such great importance. He recognized 
the immense value of the discovery, and at once took 
the poor fellow into his employ. He soon found out that 
Muhle was not only a very clever workman and turner, 
but a real genius too, who only required further instruc¬ 
tion and guidance. And so it turned out. Muhle entered 
the business, in due time he became a partner, and after 
the manufacturer’s death he was sole proprietor. At his 
death he left a fortune of millions. His wooden hat had 
been the first cause, and his clever head the cause of his 
success. 
Wliy is the Sea Salt ? 
Miss Lottie, (who, as many older folks do, forgot to say 
where she fives), asks the Doctor a question which he 
finds it rather difficult to answer. “ Why is the sea 
salt ?”—To tell the whole story about the sea so that 
boys and girls would understand it, would be a pretty 
hard matter, and it would take a book rather than an ar¬ 
ticle in the Boys’ and Girls’ Columns. We should have to 
talk about salt deposits, and go back to the very child¬ 
hood of the world as it were. You know that the water 
of the sea is salt, because you can taste it, but you do 
not know that the water that runs out of the earth, such 
as most spring and well water, is salt, because there is 
so very little in it that you do not taste it. If you place 
a very clean and bright saucer full of well water in a 
warm place, such as on the back of the stove, and wait 
until it has all dried away—evaporated, or gone off in va¬ 
por, is the better word—and the saucer is quite dry, you 
will see that it will not be bright as at first, but that the 
water left something there—a very little, but enough to 
make the saucer look dim. If the saucer, without wash¬ 
ing it, be filled again, and again, until several saucerfuls 
have been evaporated, you can at least get enough of the 
matter that is left to taste, and you will find it tastes salt 
and bitter, showing that salt and some other things 
are in well and spring water- Chemists have a much 
surer way of showing this, but we will not talk about 
that now. Now instead of the sea, the great ocean, let 
us consider a smaller body of water, such as many lakes 
in the basins of the far west, the Great Salt Lake for in¬ 
stance, which is where it receives all the streams of a 
wide extent of country, but has no outlet. All the rain 
that falls for thousands of square miles, soaking into the 
earth comes out again in places as springs, or washing 
the surface runs down the mountain sides and forms 
streams, into which waters from the springs run, and 
finally get to the lowest point, the lake. When this 
water, no salter perhaps than your well water, reaches the 
lake, it can get out only as the water got out of your 
saucer by evaporation, but just as in your saucer, the salt 
and other matters that have been washed out of the earth, 
do not evaporate. This lake for ages and ages has been 
receiving water, but getting rid of it only by evapora¬ 
tion, and now there is in the lake water which is many 
times salter than that of the ocean. I have seen in the- 
country south of Salt Lake, smaller lakes formed in the 
basin-like valleys where they get the water from all the 
mountains around, and in a dry season these would dry 
up, and the bed of the lake look like snow, the salt being 
left after the water had evaporated, sometimes so thick 
that it can be shoveled up, and this is the way people in 
that country get their salt. If the evaporation of water 
containing the merest trifle of salt can make a large lake 
like the Great Salt Lake, so very strong with salt, as to- 
be almost like brine, we can see that a great deal of the 
saltness of the ocean may have been carried into it from 
the land, and that this is one of the reasons why the sea 
is salt. 
Aunt Sue’s Fnzzle-llox. 
ANAGRAMS OP PAMOTTS BATTLES. 
1. Storm or moan. 5. He’ll rub kin. 
2. Ah ! at morn. 6. I trust zeal. 
3. Poles boast. 7. Rifle soon. 
4. Once dull. 8. No pews, C. Bunn. 
NUMERICAL ENIGMAS. 
1. With seven letters spell a welcome word, 
To youthful ears, by them most gladly heard, 
“A word in season,” this describes it well. 
It almost shows the kernel through the shell; 
My seventh, fifth and third, and sixth and fourth. 
Soon calls a strong and mighty being forth ; 
My fourth and third and first and second name 
What scholars like much less than pleasant game. 
Henry. 
2. I am composed of 16 letters : 
My 1, 2, 11, 10, is a wild animal ; sometimes tamed. 
My 6, 5, 15, 12, 2, is one of the United States. 
My 14, 7, 8,13, is a bond of union. 
My 9, 7, 3, is a propeller. 
My 4, 5, 6, is pleasant to eat but uncomfortable to- 
get into. 
My 1, 7, 16, is a receptacle. 
My whole was a noted man who died in the year 
1T90.- Geo. H. Fuller, 
pi. 
Myoneco si bet yesa arich fo dol ega. 
SQUARE WORDS. 
1. —1. A girl’s name. 2. A prognostic. 3. To restrain. 
4. A girl’s name, 
2. —1. A cape. 2. A state. 3. A cleft. 4. Observation. 
H. j. k. 
CROSS WORD. 
My first is in Xenophon but not in king, 
My next is in preach but not in sing, 
My third is in milk but not in butter, 
My fourth is in growl but not in mutter, 
Aly fifth is in bawl but not in cry, 
My sixth is in bind but not in tie, 
My seventh is in white but not in black. 
My eighth is in nail but not in tack, 
My ninth is in copy but not in book, 
My tenth is in sought but not in took. 
My eleventh is in pity but not in love, 
My twelfth is in hat but not in glove; 
These letters if taken and placed right 
A well-known city will bring to fight. Claudia. 
CHARADE. 
Aly first in music finds a place, 
A sign to all who play with grace, 
That when their gaze upon it falls, 
For repetition then it calls. 
My second, one who tidings brought 
To those who long a Saviour sought; 
Tidings of joy and Christian peace 
To sinners struggling for release. 
Complete a man of world-wide fame, 
Of noble rank and honored name, 
A mighty prince, a statesman bold, 
Whose mind vast plans of empire hold. Henry, 
decapitations. 
1. Behead that which shines and pleases 
And leave what often teases. 
2. Behead a gage d'amour. 
And leave what gave it power. 
3. The little maiden wore it. 
The cruel thing that tore it. 
4. I’m harder, far, than slag, 
I’m soft as any rag. 
DOUBLE ACROSTIC. 
The initials name a tropical plant, and the finals a 
garden flower. 
1. A man’s name. 2. A girl’s name. 3. An animal. 
4. A river of England. 5. A city of New York. 6. Sub¬ 
soil. Italian Boy. 
