I make him walk on the sand. He exactly reproduces the tracks which put me on the alert. It was certainly he who, questing for game in the night, marked the trail with his feet. He returned to his lair before daylight; and now not a single Beetle is to be seen in the open.
Another characteristic thrusts itself upon my notice. If I shake him for a moment and then place him on the ground upon his back, he remains a long time without stirring. No other insect has yet displayed such persistent immobility, though I confess that my investigations in this respect have been only superficial. The detail is so thoroughly engraved on my memory that, forty years later, when I want to experiment on the insects which are experts in the art of simulating death, I at once think of the Scarites.
A friend sends me a dozen from Cette, from the very beach on which I once passed a delightful morning in the company of this skilful mimic of the dead. They reach me in perfect condition, mixed up in the same package with some Pimeliæ (_P. bipunctata_, FAB.), their compatriots in the sands beside the sea. Of these last, a pitiable crew, many have been disembowelled, absolutely emptied; others have merely stumps instead of legs; a few, but only a few, are unwounded.
It was what one might have expected of these Carabidæ, lawless hunters one and all. Tragic events took place in the box during the journey from Cette to Sérignan. The Scarites gormandized riotously on the peaceable Pimeliæ.
Their tracks, which I followed long ago on the actual spot, bore evidence to their nocturnal rounds, apparently in search of their prey, the pot-bellied Pimelia, whose sole defence consists of a strong armour of welded wing-cases.[4] But what can such a cuirass avail against the bandit's ruthless pincers?
[Footnote 4: The Pimelia is a wingless Beetle.--_Translator's Note_.]
He is indeed a mighty hunter, this Nimrod of the sea-shore. All black and glossy, like a jet bugle, his body is divided by a very narrow groove at the waist. His weapon of offence consists of a pair of claw-like mandibles of extraordinary vigour. None of our insects equals him in strength of jaw, if we except the Stag-beetle, who is far better armed, or rather decorated, for the antlered mandibles of the inmate of the oak are ornaments of the male's attire, not a panoply of battle.