290 INSECT LIFE xxi 



hand, will cast premature and baseless theories back 

 into oblivion. 



Reaumur generally confines himself to stating 

 facts as they offered themselves to him in the normal 

 course of things, and does not attempt to penetrate 

 further into the powers of the insect by means of 

 conditions brought about artificially. In his day 

 there was everything to do, and the harvest was so 

 great that the illustrious reaper hurried on to what 

 was most urgent, — the gathering of it in, leading 

 his successors to examine grain and ear in detail. 

 Nevertheless, he mentions an experiment made on 

 Chalicodoma muraria by his friend Du Hamel. The 

 nest was placed in a glass funnel, the mouth of 

 which was closed by a piece of gauze. Three males 

 were hatched, which, though they had penetrated 

 mortar hard as a stone, either did not attempt to 

 pierce the thin gauze, or thought it beyond their 

 power to do so. All three died under the glass. 

 Insects generally only know how to execute that 

 which they need to do in the common order of 

 nature, adds Reaumur. 



For two reasons the experiment does not satisfy 

 me. First of all, to give gauze to be pierced by 

 insects with tools made to pierce lumps as hard as 

 tufa does not seem a happy idea ; you cannot expect 

 a navvy's pickaxe to do the same work as the scissors 

 of a seamstress. Secondly, the transparent glass 

 prison seems ill chosen. As soon as it had opened 

 a way through the thickness of its earthen dome, the 

 insect found itself in daylight, and to it daylight 

 means final deliverance and freedom. It strikes 

 against an invisible obstacle — the glass, and glass 



