INSECT SIPPERS AND GNAWERS. 255 
if the nut had remained on the tree, would by and 
by have worked its way out (;;*, Fig. 87), and fallen 
to the ground, where it would have gone to sleep all 
through the winter, to wake with a long thin snout, 
and a pair of delicate wings hidden under its beauti- 
ful brown wing-cases. The pea-maggot, on the other 
hand, would, if we had left it alone, have lain down 
just within the delicate skin of the pea, and there 
been transformed into a tiny brown beetle spotted 
with white. 
Many of the weevils do indeed eat the bark, and 
wood, and roots of trees, for they are a very numerous 
family, and must find food where they can, but the 
greater number of them feed on fruits, buds, flowers, 
and grains of all kinds, so that you need only hunt 
among the acorns, and wheat, and rape, and turnips, 
to make acquaintance with these tiny beetles ; or if 
you seek out the faded dingy -brown blossoms on 
an apple-tree, which remain when the other bright 
blossoms are turning into fruit, there you may find 
either a tiny chrysalis, or a short -snouted weevil, 
which has lived all its life in this blossom since its 
mother laid the egg in the early spring, and whose 
food, as a maggot, has been the tender centre of the 
flower. 
These are all plant -eating beetles, and they, or 
some of their comrades, may be found on every plant 
or tree, nay, you may even shake a shower of them 
out of the folds of a large mushroom, though they 
are so small you must get a microscope to see them, 
But the Tiger-beetle with its brilliant golden green 
wing-cases, the Bombardier -beetle (see Plate II. 
p. 135) which shoots out a vapour from its tail 
