a name given by the French writers to an insect that does vast mischief in granaries. It is properly of the scarab or beetle class; it has two antennae or horns formed of a great number of round joints, and covered with a soft and short down; from the anterior part of the head there is thrust out a trunk, which is so formed at the end, that the creature easily makes way with it through the coat or skin that covers the grain, and gets at the meal or farina on which it feeds; the inside of the grains is also the place where the female deposits her eggs, that the young progeny may be born with provision about them. When the female has pierced a grain of corn for this purpose, she deposits in it one egg, or at the utmost two, but the most frequently lays them single: these eggs hatch into small worms, which are usually found with their bodies rolled up in a spiral form, and after eating till they arrive at their full growth, they are changed into chrysalises, and from these in about a fortnight comes out the perfect calandre. The female lays a considerable number of eggs; and the increase of these creatures would be very great, but nature has so ordered it, that while in the egg state, and even while in that of the worm, they are subject to be eaten by mites: these little vermin are always very plentiful in granaries, and they destroy the far greater number of these larger animals.