Among my somewhat numerous correspondence from young people, I recall
several wondering inquiries about a certain fat, floundering "beetle,"
as "blue as indigo"; and when we consider how many other observing
youngsters, including youngsters of larger growth, have looked upon
this uncouth shape in the path, lawn, or pasture, will speculate as to
its life history, it is perhaps well to make this floundering blue
beetle better acquainted with his unappreciative neighbors.
What are the lazy blue insects doing down there in the grass, for
there are usually a small family of them. With the exception of their
tinselled indigo-blue coat, there is certainly very little to admire
in them. But what they lack in beauty they make up for in other ways.
There are many of their handsomer cousins whose history is not half
as interesting as that of this poor beetle that we tread upon in the
grass. His neighbor insect, the tiger-beetle, running hither and
thither with legs of wonderful speed, and with the agility of a fly on
the wing, readily escapes our approach; but this clumsy, helpless blue
beetle must needs plead for mercy by his color alone, because he has
no means to avert our crushing step. A little girl who met me on the
country road recently summed up the characteristics of the blue beetle
pretty well. The portrait was unmistakable. "I've got a funny blue bug
at home in a box that I want to show you," said she; "he's blue and
awful fat, and hasn't got any wings, but when you touch him, he just
turns over on his back, and trembles his toes and leaks big yellow
drops out of his elbows." I have shown her beetle--three views of him,
in fact--about the natural size, one of them on his back and "leaking"
at his elbows, for such is the infallible habit of the insect when
disturbed--a trick which has also given him the name of the "oil
beetle." He is also known as the indigo beetle.
But of what use can such a queer beetle be to himself or any one
else--a beetle that is not only without wings, but is so fat and
floundering that he can hardly lift his unwieldy body from the ground,
and which, upon being surprised, can only "play possum," and exude
great drops of oil (?) upon our palm as we examine him?
But as he pours the vials of his wrath upon us he would doubtless
fain have us understand that he was not always thus unable to take
care of himself, that he was not always the clumsy, crawling creature
that he now is. As he lies there on his back, the yellow, oily
globules of surplus "elbow grease" swelling larger and larger at his
leaky elbows, and one by one falling on the paper beneath him, we may
almost fancy the monologue which might be going on in that blue head
of his.
"Yes, I am indeed a clumsy creature," he might be saying, as he stares
upward into our faces with fixed indigo eyes, "and my cumbersome body
is a burden. But I was not always what you now see. Ah, you should
have seen me as a baby! Was there ever such a lively, acrobatic,
venturesome, plucky baby as I, even when I was a day old? Shall I tell
you some of my feats? Everybody knows me as I am _now_; but I have
taken care that few shall learn my earlier history. It takes a sharp
eye to follow my pranks of babyhood, and no one has been smart enough
to do it yet, but I will at least let you into the secret of my life
as far as it has been found out. I am little over a year old. I was
born under a stone in a meadow last April, when I crept out of a
golden-yellow case so small that you could hardly see it. I believe
your books say I was about a sixteenth of an inch long at that time.
Ah! when I think of what I _was_ and what I _could do then_, and look
at what I am _now_, I sometimes wonder whether that lively babyhood of
mine has not all been a mocking dream.
"Do you wonder that I am as blue as indigo, and am occasionally forced
to resort to my oil-tank to still the troubled waters of my later
experience? Well, as I was saying (pardon this fresh display of
tears), when I crept out of that filmy egg-sac I was just ready for
anything, and spoiling for adventure. I found myself with a slender,
agile body of thirteen joints, and three pairs of the sprightliest,
spider-like legs you ever saw, each tipped with three little sharp
claws. Now I knew that these long legs and claws were not given to me
at this early babyhood for nothing, so I looked about for something to
try them on. I had not a great while to wait, for as I crept along
through the grass roots beneath the edge of the stone, I heard a
welcome sound, which is music to all babies of my kind. I remembered
having heard the same music in my dreams while inside the little
yellow case, but now it seemed louder than ever, and in another minute
I was almost blown off my feet by the breeze which the noise made, and
a great black, hairy giant, as big as a house, pounced down just
outside the stone. He had a great black head, and six enormous legs as
big round as trees. Think how a bumblebee would look to a wee baby not
half as big as a hyphen in one of your books! Did I run when I saw
him coming? Not a bit of it. I just waited until he came close to me,
and then I jumped on his back, and put those eighteen little claws of
mine to good use as I crept over his great spiny body, and finally
found a snug resting-place beneath it. And then I waited, clinging
tightly with my clutching feet. In another moment I had begun to take
my first outing; and did ever baby have such a ride, and to such
music! After the bumblebee had remained under the stone a little while
he turned and went out again. No sooner did he get to the edge than
he spread his great buzzing wings, and away we went over the world,
higher and higher, miles high, over big oceans and mountains. I could
see them all beneath me as I clung to the underside of the bee. I
believe I must finally have got dizzy and faint, for I remember at
last finding myself at rest in a queer thicket of greenish poles with
big yellow balls at the top of them, and great giant leaves fringed
with long, glistening hairs. They told me afterwards it was a willow
blossom.
"It seemed a very good place to rest, so I dropped off from my bee and
remained. Everywhere about me, as I looked, the air was yellow with
these blossoms, and full of the wing-music of the bees. But, as I have
said, I was a restless baby, and having had a taste of travel I soon
tired of this idle life, and began to get ready for another ride. My
chance soon came. This time it was a honey-bee. She alighted in the
flower next to mine, but I quietly piled over and clutched upon her
leg, and was soon snugly tucked away under her body, with my flat head
between its segments. And now for the first time I began to feel
hungry; and what was more natural than to take a bite from the tender
flesh of this bee, so easily available? I did it, and liked it so well
that I adopted this bee for my mother for quite a long while, taking
many, many long rides every day, and always coming back to the
prettiest little house on a bench under the trees. This was a sort of
bee hotel, with many hundreds of guests. It was all partitioned off
inside into little six-sided rooms, and the walls were so thin that
you could see through them. Indeed, I soon came to like this little
home so well that one morning I decided that I would not leave it
again. I had begun to get tired of my roving life. I saw a lot of
little white fat babies tucked away in some of these little rooms, and
this very bee which I had adopted as my mother was engaged in bringing
food to some of these babies and sealing them up in their nests. This
was enough for me. I concluded to bring my roving habit to a close,
and become a bee baby in truth; so watching for my opportunity, I
loosened my clutch upon the mother bee, and dropped into one of the
little rooms.
"Then I became sleepy, and can tell you nothing more than that when I
woke up I didn't know who or what I was. My six spider legs had gone,
and I had a half-dozen little short feet instead; and instead of the
sprightly ideas of my baby days, the thought of such a thing as even
moving was a bore. But I was hungrier than ever, and the first thing I
did was to fall upon another fat youngster who disputed the room with
me, and make short work of him. That was breakfast. When dinner-time
came, I found it right at my mouth. That busy mother of mine had fully
supplied my wants, and packed my room full to the ceiling with the
most delicious, fragrant bread of flowers made of pollen and honey.
"Oh, those were good old times, with all I wanted to eat all the time,
and everything I ate turning to appetite! Too soon, too soon I found
myself getting drowsy again, and, I can only remember awakening from a
queer dream, to find even my six tiny legs gone, and, what is _worse_,
my _mouth_ also. While wondering and hoping that this was but a
troubled vision, I was plunged into sleep again, and dreamed that I
was locked up in a mummy-case for over a week. And now comes the end,
the cycle of my story. From this nightmare mummy-case I finally
awoke--awoke, and emerged as you now see me. Do you wonder that I have
had the blues ever since at the memory of those honeyed days, now
forever fled? Instead of sporting aloft in airy skyward flights, I am
now a miserable groundling. Instead of sweet, fragrant bread of
flowers, I am now forced to break my fast on acrid buttercup leaves.
But I shall live again, with joys several hundred times multiplied,
live again in my children, for whose jolly time in the autumn I shall
soon lay my plans--golden promises--here in the ground beneath the
buttercup leaves, close to a burrow where lives a burly bumblebee.
"But I have not told you all of my history, and will leave you to fill
in the blank spaces, even as some of the scientists have to do."