Читать книгу Life at the Zoo: Notes and Traditions of the Regent's Park Gardens онлайн

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Among the butterfly cages is a glass case which, since its inmates first found their way to the Zoo, has never failed to excite the utmost interest and curiosity. On the floor of the box, partly sheltered by a few green plants, are ten or a dozen gold buttons, with a red-gold centre, on a lighter gold setting, edged by a round, semi-transparent rim. If watched attentively, the buttons presently move about on invisible legs, and perhaps one suddenly splits, puts out a pair of wings, and flies. These astonishing beetles, which are at present unnamed, are from Ceylon. Above, they exactly resemble an embossed gold sleeve-button, with a rim of yellow talc. Laid on their backs, the under-side of a golden beetle appears, surrounded with the same semi-transparent rim. Trap-door spiders also flourish in the Insect House, and have made several caves, with most ingenious doors, in a large piece of rotten wood with rugged lichen-covered bark. The doors are quite irregular in shape, made to fit the surface of the hole in which the spider lives, and are of all sizes, from that of a walnut-shell to a pea. The door exactly fits the orifice, however irregular its shape, and is so cleverly covered with pieces of wood and lichen woven into the fabric, that it exactly resembles the surrounding bark; and even a prying tit might omit to probe it with its bill.