Scarab beetle

“ The Scarab, therefore, shapes the larva’s ration into a sphere (we will leave the neck of the pear out of the question for the moment) ; and this round form is not the result of blind mechanical conditions, imposing an inevitable shape upon the worker; it is not the violent effect of the rolling along the ground. We have already seen that, for the purpose of easier and swifter transit, the insect kneads into a perfect sphere the materials which it intends to consume at a distance, without moving that sphere from the spot on which it rests ”

“ But they are obliged to push the balls backward with their long hind legs: and as this precludes the possibility of the scarab seeing where it is going, each beetle pauses every now and again and turns round, like a man sculling in a boat alone, to look what is ahead of him. Sometimes in doing so he loses his ball, a misfortune which has just happened to the beetle on the right in No. 5. The precious pellet goes bounding off down hill as fast as gravitation will take it. ”

“ The pill-rollers, whether Scarabs or Gymnopleuri, never have more than a single pear, a single ovoid in their burrows. The mass of foodstuff, which at times is rolled from a great distance, is necessarily limited by the insect’s own limitations of strength. It is enough for one larva, but not enough for two. An exception must be made with respect to the Broad-necked Scarab, who brings up her family very frugally and divides her rolling booty into two modest portions. ”

“ Who has not been amused at the labors of the big black beetles that one meets in summer on dusty paths rolling balls of fibrous material. These "dung beetles" are the American cousin of the scarab of the ancient Egyptians, which typified to them many mystical ideas connected with life, present and eternal. With its shovellike head and broad forelegs the beetle gathers and compacts the material it wants, and begins to roll it, sometimes with the help, more often against the struggles, of another beetle toward a prepared nest-hole. ”

“ What might not happen to the insect’s feeble fingers, slender as thread, in consequence of this continual rubbing against the rough soil? They are merely useless encumbrances; one day or other they seem bound to disappear, crushed, torn off, worn out in a thousand ways. We know unfortunately that our own workmen are all too frequently injured in handling heavy tools and lifting great weights; even so might the Scarab be crippled in rolling his ball, an enormous load to him. ”

“ The Sacred Beetle is a passionate lover of the sun, whose image he copies in the radiating notches of his rounded shield. He needs the bright light in order to make the most of the heap whence he extracts first provisions and next materials for nest-building. The other Dung-beetles—Geotrupes, Copres, Onites, Onthophagi—for the most part have dark, mysterious habits; they work unseen under the roof of excrement; they do not begin their quest until night is at hand and the last glimmer of twilight is fading. The more trustful Scarab both seeks and finds amid the gladness of the noonday sun ”

“ With this crude equipment, excellently adapted to pickaxe-work though it be, how does the Scarab obtain the natal dwelling, the oval nest so daintily polished and glazed within? Does her foot, a regular saw, fitted with enormous teeth, begin to rival the artist’s brush in delicacy from the moment when it is inserted through the narrow orifice of the sack? Why not? I have said elsewhere, and this is the moment to say it again: the tool does not make the workman. The insect exercises its own particular talents with any kind of tool with which it is supplied. ”

“ These details remind us of certain facts noted, not without surprise, by a host of observers on the sunny beaches at Cette, Palavas, the Golfe Juan and the North African coast, down to the lonely Sahara. Here the [52] Sacred Beetle and his kinsmen—the Half-spotted Scarab, the Pock-marked Scarab and others—swarm, becoming more vigorous and more active in proportion as the climate grows hotter. They abound; and yet very often not one shows himself; the entomologist’s practised eye fails to discover a single specimen. ”

“ A fat water-beetle played a bass fiddle as big and fat as himself, and two pretty ladybugs played the violins. A scarab, brightly colored with scarlet and black, tooted upon a long horn, and a sand- beetle made the sound of a drum with its wings. ”

“ With the Ethiopian dominion a ram’s head (the emblem of Amen-ra) frequently is found upon the beetle body (fig. 80) ; while sometimes, as shown in fig. 81, the body of the scarab is replaced by the familiar Hathor head with uraei on either side.
The subjects engraved on scarab-seals. The subjects engraved on Egyptian scarab-seals may be divided into several well-defined groups. Firstly, there are those which bear hieroglyphic inscriptions. Secondly, there are those which bear figures of men, animals, or flowers; and thirdly, those which bear geometrical designs, coil and rope patterns, etc. ”

“ The veteran French naturalist, Fabre, who has devoted the leisure periods of a long life to the enthusiastic study of the ways of insects, performed several experiments on beetles in order to ascertain if the duration of their feint was in any way affected by his own presence or movements. Most of Fabre's observations were made on a large scarab beetle. When handled the beetle would throw itself into an immobile state with its head bent down and its legs drawn in close to the body. It would remain in this attitude perfectly quiet for several minutes—sometimes for over an hour. ”

“ The Mason-bees had chosen the interstices between the stones as a dormitory where to pass the night in serried groups. The powerful Eyed Lizard, who, when close-pressed, attacks wide-mouthed both man and dog, had selected a cave wherein to lie in wait for the passing Scarab (A Dung-beetle known also as the Sacred Beetle.—Translator's Note.) ; the Black-eared Chat, garbed like a Dominican, white-frocked with black wings, sat on the top stone, singing his short rustic lay: his nest, with its sky-blue eggs, must be somewhere in the heap. ”

“ Before answering this evolutionary objection, I will wait for some one to show me a natural Scarab of Horapollo’s [54] date. The hypogea which so religiously guard the cat, the ibis and the crocodile must also contain the sacred insect. All that I have at my disposal is a few figures representing the Sacred Beetle as we find him engraved on the monuments or carved in fine stone as an amulet for the mummies. The ancient artist is remarkably faithful in the execution of the whole; but his graver, his chisel have not troubled about details so insignificant as those of the tarsi. ”

“ Peters to collect postage stamps.
"A scarab," he said—"derived from the Latin scarabeus—is literally a beetle."
"I will not collect beetles!" said Mr. Peters definitely. "They give me the Willies."
"Scarabs are Egyptian symbols in the form of beetles," the specialist hurried on. "The most common form of scarab is in the shape of a ring. Scarabs were used for seals. They were also employed as beads or ornaments. Some scarabaei bear inscriptions having reference to places; as, for instance: 'Memphis is mighty forever.'"
Mr. Peters' scorn changed to active interest. ”

“ If the lack of fore-fingers were an accidental mutilation, due to violent exertion, there are other insects, Dung-beetles too, who habitually undertake works of excavation even more arduous than the Scarab’s, and who ought therefore, a fortiori, to be deprived of their front tarsi, since these are useless and even irksome when the leg has to serve as a powerful digging-implement. ”

“ The Sacred Beetle’s burrow never contains more than one pear. The Broad-necked Scarab’s contains two. I even suspect that there are sometimes three, when the haul is a large one: we shall learn more on this subject from the Copres. The first, when she gets her pill underground, uses it just as she obtained it in the workyard and does not subdivide it at all. The second breaks up hers, though it is a little smaller, into two equal parts and fashions each half into a pear. The single ball gives place to two and sometimes even perhaps to three. ”

“ And so the Scarab is endowed with matchless digestive powers. Once housed in the company of food, day and night he will not cease eating and digesting until the provisions be exhausted. It is easy, with a little practice, to bring up the Scarab in captivity, in a volery. In this way, I obtained the following evidence, [16] which will tell us of the high digestive capacity of the famous Dung-beetle.
When the whole ball has been through the mill, the hermit reappears in the light of day, seeks his fortune, finds it, shapes himself a new ball and begins all over again. ”

“ A unique example for the period is illustrated in fig. 67, where the back is scored with lines diagonally in each direction. Another typical form is shown in fig. 68, in which the threading holes are supported by a ring carved with the scarab, while the beetle itself is developed apparently from the type in fig. 63. In such scarabs the hairy legs upon the back occasionally may be noted. Another Hyksos type characteristically represents the human head (fig. 69, and compare the scarab of King Apepŷ figured in Plate I) upon the body of the scarab with or without the legs over the back. ”

“ I have seen greedy-guts manufacture a ball the size of one’s fist. Here, of a certainty, is food in the larder for days to come!
The provisions are made. The next thing is to withdraw [7] from the fray and carry the victuals to a fitting place. Here the most striking characteristics of the Scarab begin to show themselves. The Dung-beetle sets out without delay; he embraces the sphere with his two long hind-legs, whose terminal claws, planted in the mass, serve as rotatory pivots; he obtains a purchase with the middle pair of legs ”

“ Though I have only touched the fringe of the matter, I am already aware of three or four sorts of grievous accidents to which the Sacred Beetle’s larva is liable. Plants, animals, blind physical forces, all work its ruin by destroying its larder.
Competition is rife around the cake served up by the Sheep. When the mother Scarab arrives to take her share and manufacture her pill, the bit is often at the mercy of fellow-banqueters of whom the smallest are the most to be dreaded. There are especially little Onthophagi, earnest workers crouching under the shelter of the cake. ”

“ The others are obliged to dig a special burrow for each egg. When everything is in order in the new establishment—and this does not take long—they leave the underground [141] vault and go off somewhere else, wherever chance may lead them, to begin their pill-rolling, excavating and egg-laying once more. With these nomadic habits, any prolonged supervision on the mother’s part becomes impossible.
The Scarab suffers by it. Her pear, which is magnificently regular at the outset, soon shows cracks and becomes scaly and swollen. ”

“ His nymph has on its forehead a big horn, one only, bent backward; on its corselet it possesses a similar horn, jutting forward. The two, approaching their tips, look like some kind of pincers. What does the insect lack in order to acquire, on a smaller scale, the eccentric ornament of the West-Indian Scarab? It lacks perseverance. It matures the appendage of the forehead and allows that of the corselet to perish atrophied. It succeeds no better than the Bull Onthophagus in its attempt to grow a pointed stake upon its back ”

“ At first being used in their natural forms, these pebbles or gems have been grouped as lenticular or bean-shaped, and glandular or of the sling-bolt pattern; later, from the 6th to the 4th century B.C., they were fashioned as scaraboids, that is, in the general form of the Egyptian scarab, but without the sculptured details of the beetle's body. To these, by a natural process, succeeded the matrix formed of only a thin slice of stone, which was more conveniently adapted for the bezel of the ring; and in this shape the engraved matrix passed on from the Greeks to the Romans. ”

“ Egypt was consequently a vast sepulchre: it has been estimated by eminent authorities that there were over seven hundred millions of the dead preserved in tombs and graves.
The scarab is an Egyptian beetle of varying size; I have seen lots of living specimens on the Nile. The ancients believed that if this beetle were placed in the coffin or grave of the dead, no harm could come to them, and that its presence would promote their future happiness and bring them good luck; therefore, it became the custom to place the scarabs in all graves. ”

“ A third and more numerous class of Etruscan signet rings have scarabs, cut usually in sard or carnelian, which are a link between the art of Egypt and that of Greece, the design cut on the flat side being Hellenic in style, while the back is shaped like the ordinary Egyptian scarabaeus beetle. One from Etruria, now in the British Museum, is formed by two minutely modelled lions whose bodies form the hoop, while their paws hold the bezel, a scarab engraved with a lion of heraldic character. ”

“ The Scarab does not always push his precious ball alone: sometimes he takes a partner; or, to be accurate, the partner takes him. This is the way in which things usually happen: once his ball is ready, a Dung-beetle issues from the crowd and leaves the workyard, pushing his prize backwards. A neighbour, a newcomer, whose own task is hardly begun, abruptly drops his work and runs to the moving ball, to lend a hand to the lucky owner, who seems to accept the proffered aid kindly. Henceforth the two work in partnership. Each does his best to push the pellet to a place of safety. ”