As a rule, when a carcass appears, a pair of burying beetles of the same species--a husband and wife--fly up to the scene of operations together and take possession of the prey; though in the illustration Mr. Enock has represented several kinds engaged at once in staking out claims, which indeed happens often enough in nature. But if you count the number on any one dead bird or animal, you will almost always find they are even in number--in other words, so many pairs, male and female. No. 2 shows us the next act in the funeral drama. The male beetles, after satisfying their own immediate hunger, proceed to bury the carcass in a very curious and laborious manner. You would wonder how so small a creature could produce so great a result: the fact is, the beetles attain their end by continuous under-cutting. The female hides herself in the body: the male buries her alive and the dead creature with her. He first drags the mouse, frog, or bird to a suitable spot where the soil is soft enough to admit of excavation; and sometimes three or four males have to combine for this purpose. They then proceed to dig with their heads, which are tools specialized for the purpose, and provided with strong and powerful muscles. The antennæ have also assumed for this object a short club-shaped type, very suitable for a navvy's mattock. The little engineers begin by excavating a furrow all round the body, and then a second inside that again, throwing the earth out of each into the previous one: and so on till the carcass begins to sink into the hollow. They then dig and tunnel beneath it, carrying out loads of earth, one after another, till bit by bit the carcass collapses into the hole, first in front, then behind, and has reached a level considerably below the surface. Then they throw in the earth they have excavated, and cover up the body with the females inside it; after which, I regret to say, they proceed to hold a very cannibalistic funeral service above it. The funeral service consists in eating as much of the body as they desire for their own purposes: when they have satisfied their appetite, they begin to think of the interests of posterity. The mother beetle proceeds to lay her tale of eggs in the decently-buried body, for every animal knows by instinct the precise place in which to deposit its young and the precise food which happens to suit them.