FABRE'S BOOK OF INSECTS 



scarce in these parts; and I should never have managed 

 to secure a suitable number of subjects for my studies 

 had it not been for an assistant whom I have already 

 mentioned more than once. 



I speak of my little son Paul, aged seven. He is my 

 enthusiastic companion on my hunting expeditions, and 

 knows better than any one of his age the secrets of the 

 Cicada, the Locust, the Cricket, and especially the 

 Scavenger Beetle. Twenty paces away his sharp eyes 

 will distinguish the real mound that marks a burrow 

 from casual heaps of earth. His delicate ears catch 

 the Grasshopper's faint song, which is quite unheard by 

 me. He lends me his sight and hearing; and I, in ex- 

 change, present him with ideas, which he receives 

 attentively. 



Little Paul has his own insect-cages, in which the 

 Sacred Beetle makes pears for him; his own little garden, 

 no larger than a pocket-handkerchief, where he grows 

 beans, often digging them up to see if the tiny roots are 

 any longer; his forest plantation, in which stand four 

 oaks a hand's-breadth high, still furnished on one side 

 with the acorn that feeds them. It all makes a welcome 

 change from grammar, which gets on none the worse for 

 it. 



When the month of May is near at hand Paul and I 

 get up early one morning — so early that we start without 

 our breakfast — and we explore, at the foot of the moun- 



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