CHAPTER IV.

The stag-beetle--Evening flight--Appearance on the wing--Seeking a mate--Stag and doe in a hedge--The plough-man and the beetle--A stag-beetle's fate--Concerning tenacity of life--Life appearances after death--A serpent's skin--A dead glow-worm's light--Little summer tragedies--A snaky spot--An adder's basking-place--Watching adders--The adder's senses--Adder's habits not well known--A pair of anxious pewits--A dead young pewit--Animals without knowledge of death--Removal of the dead by ants--Gould's observations on ants.