THE insect's place IN NATURE. I27 



with which they do their regular work." This is common 

 knowledge now, but it was all quite new and strange to 

 most people when Michelet stopped to rest a little from 

 waiting big history-books about people who had long been 

 dead to tell what he had found out about insects and their 

 ways. He pointed out the fact that insects all have trades 

 as well as tools, and then went on to say : 



"The great acliievenieiit of the artist, or, to use the language of 

 our ancient corporations, the test-work of this workman, by which 

 he proves himself to be a master, is the cradle. In the insect 

 world, as the mother generally dies in giving birth to her child, it 

 is important to provide an ingenious asylum which shall protect 

 and support the orphan, and supply the mother's place. So diffi- 

 cult a work requires tools which seem to us inexplicable. This, 

 which you compare to a medieval poignard, to the subtly treacher- 

 ous weapon of the Italian bravado, is, on the contrary, an instru- 

 ment of love and maternity. 



" For the rest, nature is so far from sharing our prejudices, dis- 

 likes, and childish apprehensions, that she seems specially to care 

 for and protect the gnawing species which injuriously interfere 

 with the economy of our small farms and plantations, but which, 

 on the other hand, lend valuable assistance in maintaining the bal- 

 ance of species and keeping down the vegetable accumulation of 

 certain climates. She preserves with watchful anxiety the cater- 

 pillars which we destroy. In the case of the oak-grub she is mind- 

 ful to glaze over or varnish its eggs, so that, concealed under the 

 withered leaf, and beaten by winds and 'rains, they may safely 

 brave the winter. The crawling worms make their appearance 

 clothed in and defended by a thick furry garb, which deceives their 

 enemies, until, transformed into moths, they fly to and fro in hap- 

 py freedom under cover of the night. 



' ' For some she invents still greater precautions. Essential agents, 

 undoubtedly, in the transformation of life, they possess, beyond 

 all others, the guarantees of existence which secure them, infalli- 

 bly, an immortalit}^ of race. 



"The grvibs [Aphids], for instance, alternately viviparous and 

 oviparous, spring into full life in the summer, that the}' may the 

 more quickly set to work, but are prduced in autumn in the shapeo 

 of an egg, that they may the better endure the cold of winter. Fi- 

 nally, their generous mother reserves for this beloved species an un- 



