INSECT SIPPERS AND GNA WERS. 259 
chamber and fills it with prepared dung in which to 
lay her egg* It is again among the carrion beetles 
that we find the " Sexton," burying dead animals care- 
fully under the soil, and then laying her eggs in them. 
The history of these sexton beetles is most extra- 
ordinary. They hunt in couples, male and female, 
often many couples together, and wherever they find 
a dead bird or mouse, rat or frog, they first feed till 
they are satisfied, and then drag the body to a soft 
place in the ground. Here the male beetles set to 
work, and with their strong heads dig a furrow all 
round the animal, then another and another, till little 
by little the carcass sinks down, so that actually in 
about twenty-four hours it is below the ground, and 
they can cover it with earth, burying the mother 
beetles with it. Then the fathers too burrow down, 
and all is quiet and still — but not for long, for no 
sooner has the mother beetle laid her eggs in the 
dead body safe out of sight of all enemies, than both 
mother and father make their way out of the earth 
and fly away. Meanwhile, the eggs left in the de- 
cayed body are soon hatched, and the grubs feed for 
three or four weeks, and then each building a cell, 
lies down to undergo its change, and comes out of 
the earth a perfect sexton beetle. 
At first sight it seems almost impossible that 
such small creatures can bury others so much larger 
than themselves, yet Miss Staveley,t a good authority, 
states that four of these beetles have been known to 
bury in fifty days, four frogs, three small birds, two 
* For an interesting account of these beetles, showing that the 
idea of an egg being contained in the rolling ball is erroneous, see 
M. T. H. Fabre, Souvenirs Entomologiques, Paris, 1879. 
+ British Insects, p. 74. 
