The Sacred Beetle: the Pear 



is in the centre of the mass, the place which 

 over-hasty considerations made us but now 

 believe the most suitable. Well, the point 

 which we selected is fatal to life. The egg 

 dies there. What has it lacked? Ap- 

 parently, proper aeration. 



Plenteously enveloped by the clammy 

 mass, which is a bad conductor of heat, it is 

 also deprived of the mild temperature 

 needed for its hatching. In addition to air, 

 every germ requires heat. In order to be 

 as near as possible to the incubator, the germ 

 in the bird's egg is on the surface of the 

 yolk and, thanks to its extreme mobility, 

 always comes to the top, no matter what the 

 position of the egg may be. Thus the most 

 is made of the maternal heating-apparatus 

 seated upon the brood. 



In the insect's case, the incubator is the 

 earth, which is warmed by the sun. Its 

 germ likewise comes close to the heating- 

 apparatus; it goes as near as it can to the 

 universal incubator, in search of its spark of 

 life; instead of remaining sunk in the middle 

 of the inert mass, it takes up its position at 

 the top of a projecting nipple, lapped on all 

 sides by the warm emanations of the soil. 



These conditions, air and warmth, are so 

 fundamental that no Dung-beetle neglects 



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