The Bluebottle: The Laying 



mothers abstain, judging the slender obstacle 

 of the paper to be more than the vermin will 

 be able to overcome. 



This caution on the Fly's part does not at 

 all surprise me: motherhood everywhere has 

 gleams of great perspicacity. What does 

 astonish me is the following result. The par- 

 cels containing the Linnets are left for a whole 

 year uncovered on the table; they remain there 

 for a second year and a third. I inspect the 

 contents from time to time. The little birds 

 are intact, with unrumpled feathers, free from 

 smell, dry and light, like mummies. They have 

 become not decomposed, but mummified. 



I expected to see them putrefying, running 

 into sanies, like corpses left to rot in the open 

 air. On the contrary, the birds have dried 

 and hardened, without undergoing any 

 change. What did they want for their putre- 

 faction? Simply the intervention of the Fly. 

 The maggot, therefore, is the primary cause of 

 dissolution after death; it is, above all, the 

 putrefactive chemist. 



A conclusion not devoid of value may be 

 drawn from my paper game-bags. In our 

 markets, especially in those of the South, the 

 game is hung unprotected from the hooks on 

 the stalls. Larks strung up by the dozen with 

 325 



