ir CERCERIS TUBERCULATA 6i 



to the action of the pile Coleoptera really dead, 

 Blaps, Saperda, Lamia, asphyxiated by benzine or 

 sulphureous gas, and two hours later it was im- 

 possible to provoke the movements obtained so 

 easily from weevils lying already for several days 

 in the singular state, intermediate between life and 

 death, into which their redoubtable enemy plunges 

 them. 



All these facts contradict the supposition of an 

 animal completely dead, and the hypothesis of a 

 real corpse rendered incorruptible by some antiseptic 

 liquid. One can only explain them by admitting 

 that the animal is struck in the principle of its move- 

 ments, and that sensitiveness, suddenly benumbed, 

 dies slowly out, while the more tenacious, vegetative 

 functions die yet more slowly and preserve the 

 intestines during the time necessary for the larva. 



The most important detail to show was how the 

 murder is committed. Evidently, the chief part 

 must be played by the poisoned dart of the Cerceris. 

 But where and how does it penetrate the body of 

 the weevil, covered with a hard cuirass, with pieces 

 so closely joined ? Even under the magnifying glass 

 nothing told where the sting entered. Direct ex- 

 amination, therefore, was required to discover the 

 murderous ways of the Cerceris — a problem before 

 whose difficulties L^on Dufour had already recoiled, 

 and the solution of which seemed to me for a time 

 impossible. I tried, however, and had the satis- 

 faction of succeeding, though not without some 

 groping about. 



When they fly from their holes to the chase, the 

 Cerceris go here and there, sometimes on one 



