214 THE BIRD 



the insects have avenged the bird. It has become necessary to recall 

 in all haste the banished. In the island of Bourbon, for example, a 

 price was set on each martin's head; they disappeared, and then the 

 grasshoppers took possession of the island, devouring, extinguishing, 

 burning up with harsh acridity all that they did not devour. The 

 same thing has occurred in North America ^vath the starling, the pro- 

 tector of the maize. The spaiTOw even, which attacks the grain, but 

 also defends it — the thieving, pilfering sparrow, loaded with so many 

 insults, and stricken with so many maledictions — it has been seen 

 that without him Hungary would perish; that he alone could wage 

 the mighty war against the cockchafers and the myriad winged foes 

 which reign in the low-lying lands : his banishment has been revoked, 

 and the courageous militia hastily recalled which, if not strictly dis- 

 ciplined, are not the less the salvation of the country. 



No long time ago, near Rouen, and in the valley of Monville, the 

 crows had for a considerable period been proscribed. The cockchafers, 

 accordingly, profited to such an extent — their larvae, multipled a,d 

 injinitur)i, pushed so far their subten'anean works — that an entire, 

 meadow was pointed out to me as completely withered on the surface ; 

 every root of grass or herb was eaten up ; and all the turf easily 

 detached, could be rolled back on itself just as one raises a 

 carpet. 



All toil, aU appeals of man to nature, supposes the intelligence of 

 the natural order. Such is the order, and such the law : Life has 

 around it and within it its enemy — onost frequently as its guest — the 

 parasite which undermines and cankers it. 



Inert and defenceless life, especially vegetable, deprived of loco- 

 motion, would succumb to it but for the stronger support of the inde- 

 fatigable enemy of the parasite, the merciless pursuer, the winged 

 conqueror of the monsters. 



The war rages xvithout under the Tropics, where they surge up on 

 all sides. Within in our climates, where everything is hidden, more 

 profound, and more mysterious. 



In the exuberant fecundity of the Torrid Zone, the insects, those 



