CHAPTER II 



THE ANTHRAX 



I MADE the acquaintance of the Anthrax in 

 1855 at Carpentras, at the time when the 

 life-history of the Oil-beetles was causing me 

 to search the tall slopes beloved of the Antho- 

 phora-bees/ Her curious pupge, so powerfully 

 equipped to force an outlet for the perfect 

 insect incapable of the least effort, those pupae 

 armed with a multiple ploughshare at the fore, 

 a trident at the rear and rows of harpoons on 

 the back wherewith to rip open the Osmia- 

 bee's cocoon and break through the hard crust 

 of the hill-side, betokened a field that was 

 worth cultivating. The little that I said about 

 her at the time brought me urgent entreaties: 

 I was asked for a circumstantial chapter on the 

 strange Fly. The stern necessities of life post- 

 poned to an ever-retreating future my beloved 

 investigations, so miserably stifled. Thirty 

 years have passed ; at last, a little leisure is at 

 hand; and here, in the harmas of my village, 

 with an ardour that has in no wise grown old, 



lA species of Mason-bees. — Translator's Note. 

 28 



