Nothing is left but the closed boat-shaped wing-covers and the fore parts of the body.

The empty shell is left lying on the scene of the tragedy.
In this way must have perished the beetles--always males--whose remains I find in the cage from time to time; thus the survivors also will perish.

Between the middle of June and the 1st of August the inhabitants of the cage, twenty-five in number at the outset, are reduced to five, all of whom are females.

All the males, to the number of twenty, have disappeared, eviscerated and completely emptied.

And by whom?
Apparently by the females.
That this is the case is attested in the first place by the two assaults of which I was perchance the witness; on two occasions, in broad daylight, I saw the female devouring the male, having opened the abdomen under the wing-covers, or having at least attempted to do so.