Two boys once thought to play a trick on Charles Darwin. They took the body of a centipede, the wings of a butterfly, the legs of a grasshopper and the head of a beetle, and glued these together to form a weird monster. With the composite creature in a box, they visited Darwin.
"Please, sir, will you tell us what sort of a bug this is?" the spokesman asked.
The naturalist gave a short glance at the exhibit and a long glance at the boys.
"Did it hum?" he inquired solemnly.
The boys replied enthusiastically, in one voice:
"Oh, yes, sir."
"Well, then," Darwin declared, "it is a humbug."
