A Scientific Slaughterer 



motor centres with the Wasp's feeble instru- 

 ment, the sting: through the joint between the 

 neck and the corselet; and through the joint 

 between the corselet and the rest of the 

 thorax, in short, between the first and second 

 pair of legs. The way through the joint of 

 the neck is hardly suitable : it is too far from 

 the ganglia, which are near the base of the 

 legs which they endow with movement. It 

 is at the other point and there alone that the 

 blow must be struck. That would be the 

 opinion of the academy in which the Claude 

 Bernards were treating the question in the 

 light of their profound knowledge. And it 

 is here, just here, between the first and second 

 pair of legs, on the median line of the lower 

 surface, that the Wasp inserts her dirk. By 

 what expert instinct is she inspired? 



To select, as the spot wherein to drive her 

 sting, the one vulnerable point, the point 

 which none save a physiologist versed in 

 insect anatomy could determine beforehand: 

 even that is far from being enough. The 

 Wasp has a much greater difficulty to sur- 

 mount; and she surmounts it with an ease that 

 stupefies us. The nerve-centres governing 

 the locomotory organs of the insect are, we 

 were saying, three in number. They are 

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