COCKCHAFFER, OR MELOLONTHA. 105 
Lucy. So early ! I thought no flies 
or beetles made their appearance before 
the mild weather of spring. 
Mother. Nor does this beetle make 
its appearance in January; it only emerges 
from the chrysalis ; and in this respect 
differs from most other insects ; for it 
does not immediately attain its full 
strength, nor do the shells acquire their 
due hardness for three or four months, 
but remain soft, and have a brighter 
colour than in their perfect state: it also 
seems to lose for that period its vora- 
cious appetite, and appears sickly and in- 
active. 
Lucy. And when they come out of 
their holes, what places do they fre- 
quent ? 
Mother. In the first warm evenings 
of May they issue from the ground ; 
whence husbandmen call them May-bugs. 
Avoiding the heat of the sun, they repose 
during the day under the shade of those 
trees, the leaves of which they eat ; but 
towards dusk they take wing, and fly in 
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