Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 43.djvu/547

 shorter one, which projects from the head, being armed with several huge teeth. Insects of the male sex only are provided with these immense horns, those of the opposite sex being quite a different-looking beetle, being without any trace of these projections. There is a species that inhabits the southern United States that also belongs to this genus, but it is much smaller, being about two and a half inches long.

The "stag beetle" of Europe is another strange form, the mandibles of the male being greatly enlarged. From the shape and size of the jaws one would suppose that this insect is predaceous, but it is on the contrary a vegetable feeder, using its great jaws to wound the plant, which causes the sap or juices to flow, upon which it feeds. The jaws of the females are in no way conspicuous. There is also a closely allied species found in the United States, but it is a smaller insect. Many other curious forms are found among the beetles, but they are too many to mention.

The Lepidoptera, or butterflies and moths, have a few odd forms among them. One of the most interesting is what is known as the "dead-leaf" butterfly, found in the Malay Archipelago. The under side of this butterfly greatly resembles a dead or dried leaf, so much so that it is next to an impossibility to detect it when it alights among withered bushes. Wallace, in his book The Malay Archipelago, says of this insect: "Its upper surface is of a rich purple, variously tinged with ash color, and across the fore wings there is a broad bar of deep orange, so that when on the wing it is very conspicuous.... I often tried to capture it, without success, for, after flying a short distance, it would enter a bush among dead or dried leaves, and, however carefully I crept up to the spot, I could never discover it until it would suddenly