314 SOCIAL LIFE IN THE INSECT WORLD 



as a sheet of gauze and describe the inextricable labyrinth 

 of the nervuration, there must be something better and 

 more wonderful than a mould. There is a prototypical 

 plan, an ideal pattern, which imposes a precise position 

 upon each atom of the tissue. Before the material com- 

 mences to circulate the configuration is already virtually 

 traced, the courses of the plastic currents are already 

 mapped out. The stones of our buildings co-ordinate 

 according to the considered plan of the architect ; they 

 form an ideal assemblage before they exist as a concrete 

 assemblage. 



Similarly, the wing of a cricket, that wonderful piece of 

 lace-work emerging from a tiny sheath, speaks to us of 

 another Architect, the author of the plans according to 

 which life labours. 



The genesis of living creatures offers to our contempla- 

 tion an infinity of wonders far greater than this matter of 

 a locust's wing ; but in general they pass unperceived, 

 obscured as they are by the veil of time. 



Time, in the deliberation of mysteries, deprives us of 

 the most astonishing of spectacles except our spirits be 

 endowed with a tenacious patience. Here by exception 

 the fact is accomplished with a swiftness that forces 

 the attention. 



Whosoever would gain, without wearisome delays, a 

 glimpse of the inconceivable dexterity with which the 

 forces of life can labour, has only to consider the great 

 locust of the vineyard. The insect will show him that 

 which is hidden from our curiosity by extreme delibera- 

 tion in the germinating seed, the opening leaf, and the 

 budding flower. We cannot see the grass grow ; but we 

 can watch the growth of the locust's wings. 



