FABRE'S BOOK OF INSECTS 



coloured Fly has five or six weeks before her wherein to 

 explore the clay nests amid the thyme and to take her 

 small share of the joys of life. 



Ill 



THE WAY IN 



IF you have paid attention to this story of the Anthrax 

 Fly, you must have noticed that it is incomplete. 

 The Fox in the fable saw how the Lion's visitors en- 

 tered his den, but did not see how they went out. With 

 us the case is reversed: we know the way out of the 

 Mason-bee's fortress, but we do not know the way in. To 

 leave the cell whose owner it has eaten, the Anthrax be- 

 comes a boring-tool. When the exit-tunnel is opened 

 this tool splits like a pod bursting in the sun, and from 

 the strong framework there escapes a dainty Fly. A soft 

 bit of fluif that contrasts strangely with the roughness of 

 the prison whence it comes. On this point we know 

 pretty well what there is to know. But the entrance of 

 the grub into the cell puzzled me for a quarter of a cen- 

 tury. 



It is plain that the mother cannot place her egg in the 

 Bee's cell, which is closed and barricaded with a cement 

 wall. To pierce it she would have to become a boring- 

 tool once more, and get into the cast-off rags which she 

 left at the doorway of the exit-tunnel. She would have 



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