CHAPTER XII 



THE GEOTRUPES: THE PUBLIC HEALTH 



TO complete the q^-cle of the year in the 

 adult form, to see one's self surrounded 

 by one's sons at the spring festival, to double 

 and treble one's family: that surely is a most 

 exceptional privilege in the insect world. 

 The Bees, the aristocracy of instinct, perish 

 once the honey-pot is filled; the Butterflies, 

 the aristocracy not of instinct but of dress, 

 die when they have fastened their packet of 

 eggs in a propitious spot; the richly-armoured 

 Ground-beetles succumb when the germs of a 

 posterity are scattered beneath the stones. 



So with the others, except among the social 

 insects, where the mother survives, either 

 alone or accompanied by her attendants. It 

 is a general law: the Insect is born orphaned 

 of both its parents. And lo, by an un- 

 expected turn of fate, the humble scavenger 

 escapes the catastrophes that devour the 

 mighty! The Dung-beetle, sated with days, 

 becomes a patriarch. 



This longevity explains first of all a fact 

 272 



