The Larva and the Nymph 



Itself a passage through the sand and comes 

 out one fine morning into the light of day, 

 undazzled by that hitherto unknown radiance. 

 Bathed in sunshine, the Sphex brushes her 

 antennae and her wings, passes and repasses 

 her legs over her abdomen, washes her eyes 

 with her front tarsi wetted with saliva, like a 

 cat; and, her toilet finished, flies away joy- 

 fully: she has two months to live. 



You pretty Sphex-wasps hatched before 

 my eyes, brought up by my hand, ration by 

 ration, on a bed of sand in an old quill-box; 

 you whose transformations I have followed 

 step by step, starting up from my sleep in 

 alarm lest I should have missed the moment 

 when the nymph is bursting its swaddling- 

 bands or the wing leaving its case; you who 

 have taught me so much and learnt nothing 

 yourselves, knowing without teachers all that 

 you have to know : O my pretty Sphex-wasps, 

 fly away without fear of my tubes, my boxes, 

 my bottles, or any of my receptacles, through 

 this warm sunlight beloved of the Cicadae; ^ 

 go, but beware of the Praying Mantis,^ who 

 is plotting your ruin on the flowering heads 



^Cf. Social Life in the Insect IVorld: chaps, i. to iv. — 

 Translator's Note. 



-Ci. Social Life in the Insect IVorld: chaps, v. to vii 

 — Translator's Note. 



113 



