The Life of the Fly 



Ion; he realized in a glass tube the hitherto 

 unknown labours of gastric chemistry. I, his 

 distant disciple, behold once more, under a 

 most unexpected aspect, what struck the Ital- 

 ian scientist so forcibly. Worms take the 

 place of the Crows. They slaver upon meat, 

 gluten, albumen ; and those substances turn to 

 fluid. What our stomach does within its mys- 

 terious recesses the maggot achieves outside, 

 in the open air. It first digests and then im- 

 bibes. 



When we see it plunging into the carrion 

 broth, we even wonder if it cannot feed itself, 

 at least to some extent, in a more direct fash- 

 ion. Why should not its skin, which is one 

 of the most delicate, be capable of absorbing? 

 I have seen the egg of the Sacred Beetle and 

 other Dung-beetles^ growing considerably 

 larger — I should like to say, feeding — in the 

 thick atmosphere of the hatching-chamber. 

 Nothing tells us that the grub of the Green- 

 bottle does not adopt this method of growing. 

 I picture it capable of feeding all over the sur- 

 face of its body. To the gruel absorbed by 

 the mouth it adds the balance of what is gath- 



^Cf. Insect Life: chaps, i and ii; and The Life and 

 Love of the Insect: chaps, i to iv and vii. — Translator's 

 Note, 



230 



