cted. The ferocious beast of prey, the ogre who devours all
creatures that are not too strong for him, is himself killed and eaten:
by his fellows, and by many others.

Standing one day in the shadow of the plane-trees that grow before my
door, I see a Golden Gardener go by as if on pressing business. The
pilgrim is well met; he will go to swell the contents of my vivarium. In
capturing him I notice that the extremities of the wing-covers are
slightly damaged. Is this the result of a struggle between rivals? There
is nothing to tell me. The essential thing is that the insect should not
be handicapped by any serious injury. Inspected, and found to be without
any serious wound and fit for service, it is introduced into the glass
dwelling of its twenty-five future companions.

Next day I look for the new inmate. It is dead. Its comrades have
attacked it during the night and have cleaned out its abdomen,
insufficiently protected by the damaged wing-covers. The operation has
been performed very cleanly, without any dismemberment. Claws, head,
corselet, all are correctly in place; the abdomen only has a gaping
wound through which its contents have been removed. What remains is a
kind of golden shell, formed of the two conjoined elytra. The shell of
an oyster emptied of its inmate is not more empty.

This result astonishes me, for I have taken good care that the cage
should never be long without food. The snail, the pine-cockchafer, the
Praying Mantis, the lob-worm, the caterpillar, and other favourite
insects, have all been given in alternation and in sufficient
quantities. In devouring a brother whose damaged armour lent itself to
any easy attack my beetles had not the excuse of hunger.

Is it their custom to kill the wounded and to eviscerate such of their
fellows as suffer damage? Pity is unknown among insects. At the sight of
the desperate struggles of a crippled fellow-creature none of the same
family will cry a halt, none will attempt to come to its aid. Among the
carnivorous insects the matter may develop to a tragic termination. With
them, the passers-by will often run to the cripple. But do they do so in
order to help it? By no means: merely to taste its flesh, and, if they
find it agreeable, to perform the most radical cure of its ills by
devouring it.

It is possible, therefore, that the Gardener with the injured
wing-covers had tempted his fellows by the sight of his imperfectly
covered back. They saw in thei