CHAPTER XIV 



THE BEMBEX 



ONE of my favourite spots for the ob- 

 servations which I will now describe is 

 not far from Avignon, on the right bank of 

 the Rhone, opposite the mouth of the Du- 

 rance. It is the Bois des Issarts. Let not 

 the reader mistake the value of this word 

 bois, which usually suggests a carpet of cool 

 moss and the shade of tall trees, with a dim 

 light filtering through the leaves. The 

 scorched plains where the Cicada grates out 

 his ditty on the pale olive-tree know none 

 of these delicious retreats filled with cool 

 shadow. 



The Bois des Issarts is a coppice of holm- 

 oaks, no higher than one's head and spar- 

 ingly distributed in scanty clumps which, even 

 at their feet, hardly temper the force of the 

 sun's rays. When I used to settle myself 

 in some part of the coppice suitable for my 

 observations, on certain afternoons in the 

 dog-days of July and August, I had the shel- 

 ter of a large umbrella, which later, in the 

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