Pine Bluff daily graphic. (Pine Bluff, Ark.) 1893-1942, 1899-05-15
THE SACRED BnhfLE4
THE CURIOUS PERFo MANCEs THAT
LED TO HIS DELEGATION.

1t Was Reverenced by the Egyptians DUR
ing Life and Preserved After Death-4he
Great Sagacitv Displayed by 1t Eor the
Preservation of It's Young.
As far as I can make out, q pair OF
beetles. male and female, seem usualiy
to share a hole in common, and TO ron
balls of food to it either alone OF ~
concert. | cannot say have ever seen
much cooperation except between
sucb partners. Once a ball is secuFed
and safely ianded-for here, as else-
where, there's many a slip tWlAt Tue
cup and the Iip-the happy coupe Pto
coed to eat it up, and apparently 40 n l.1S
emerge again from their DurroW III
the supply is exhausted. Patieht Ia
turalists say that one ball mas peeh
known to last a scarab as long as
fortnight but this | do not youch lot
of personal knowledge. When more
food is wanted, the couple emerge once
more on the open sand and begin 10
collect fresh dung and refuse, when
they roll into n new food ball and then
dry and harden.
Till very lately it was universally be-
lieved that the female scarab lald an
egg IL some of the balls, and that the
young grubs Matched within such food
stocks and began at once to deYour
them. This belief has recently been
contradieted with great emphasis by
good French observer, who opened
many balls and found no eggs; but /
cannot accept his conclusion. l opened
a number of balls myself near Venice
this year, and saw in several one or
two eggs, while in one case (unearthed
from a hole) I discovered a half-grown
larva. | venture, therefore, in this
matter to believe my own eyes as
against those of even the most cele-
brated and authoritative entomoio-
gists In Egypt it has been uniyers-
ally believed from all antiquity-and
think quite rightly-that after the
scarab has laid an egg In the ball the
parents unite in rolling it to place
of safety, above the level of the an
nual fnundation due to the rise of the
Nile. At any rate. scarabs abound in
Egypt.
At a very early date it would seem,
the curious action Of these beetles at
tracted the attention of the ancient
Egyptians, whose worship of animals
was one of the most marked features
of their monstrous religion. Hence
grew a strange and widespread super
stition. A race which deifed the
hawk, the cat, the Ibis and the jaekal
was not likely to overlook the marvel
lous proceedings of the pious and
dutiful scarab. So the very early
Egyptians, we may conjecture. began
by thinking there must be something
divine in the nature of an insect which
worked SO eeaselesslF en- behalf of its
young. and rolled such big round balls
behind it up such relatively large bill
locks. Watching a little closer, as
time went on, the Egyptian discov-
cred, no doubt, that sacred beetles did
not proceed directly from sacred bee
ties. like lambs from ewes, but grew,
as it were, out Of the dirt and corrup-
ton of the mysterious pellets
A modern observer would, Of course,
at once suspect that the scarab laid an
egg inside the ball, and would prompt.
ly proceed to pull one open and look
for it. But that cold scientific method
was not likely to commend itself to
the mystic and deeply religious Egyps
tan mind. The priests by the Nile
jumped rather to the conclusion that
the scarab collected dirt in order to
make a future scarab out of clay. and
that from this dirt the young beetle
grew, self-existent, self-deYeloped, self
created. Considering the absence of
scientific knowledge and comparative
groups of scientific facts at the time
such a conclusion was by no means
unnatural Once started on so strange
a set of ideas, the Egyptians proceed
ed to evolve a worship of the scarab
which grew ever and developed, as
they thought the scarab itself did,
practically out of nothing. The inn
mortality of the soul and the resurrec.
ton of the body were the central Ideas
Of Egyptian religion; the thinkers of
Thebes and Memphis instantly per-
ceiyed a fanciful anology between the
scarab rising from its bed of dirt and
the mummy reyiving when the expect.
ed day of resurrection should at last
arrive. AS a consequence of this an.
alogy the scarab was made sacred. It
was reverenced during its life and
often preserved after It's death. like
the mummied cats and hawks and sa.
cred Apis bulls which formed such spe-
cial objects of generation to the deyout
Of Egypt.-Grant Allen.