mal size. A few adults,
connections, assuredly, of the brood, are also stirring amid the
infected mass. The period of hatching is over now; and food is
plentiful. Having nothing else to do, the foster-parents have sat down
to the feast with the nurselings.

The undertakers are quick at rearing a family. It is at most a
fortnight since the Rat was laid in the earth; and here already is a
vigorous population on the verge of the metamorphosis. Such precocity
amazes me. It would seem as though the liquefaction of carrion, deadly
to any other stomach, is in this case a food productive of especial
energy, which stimulates the organism and accelerates its growth, so
that the victuals may be consumed before its approaching conversion
into mould. Living chemistry makes haste to outstrip the ultimate
reactions of mineral chemistry.

White, naked, blind, possessing the habitual attributes of life in
darkness, the larva, with its lanceolate outline, is slightly
reminiscent of the grub of the Ground-beetle. The mandibles are black
and powerful, making excellent scissors for dissection. The limbs are
short, but capable of a quick, toddling gait. The segments of the
abdomen are armoured on the upper surface with a narrow reddish plate,
armed with four tiny spikes, whose office apparently is to furnish
points of support when the larva quits the natal dwelling and dives
into the soil, there to undergo the transformation. The thoracic
segments are provided with wider plates, but unarmed.

The adults discovered in the company of their larval family, in this
putridity that was a Rat, are all abominably verminous. So shiny and
neat in their attire, when at work under the first Moles of April, the
Necrophori, when June approaches, become odious to look upon. A layer
of parasites envelops them; insinuating itself into the joints, it
forms an almost continuous surface. The insect presents a misshapen
appearance under this overcoat of vermin, which my hair-pencil can
hardly brush aside. Driven off the belly, the horde make the tour of
the sufferer and encamp on his back, refusing to relinquish their hold.

I recognize among them the Beetle's Gamasis, the Tick who so often
soils the ventral amethyst of our Geotrupes. No; the prizes of life do
not fall to the share of the useful. Necrophori and Geotrupes devote
themselves to works of general salubrity; and these two corporations,
so interesting in the accomplishment of their hygienic function