The Life of the Caterpillar 



them will quit the assembly until the evening, 

 or perhaps next morning, when the heady 

 fumes have evaporated. Then the mass be- 

 comes disentangled; and the insects extricate 

 themselves from one another's embraces and 

 slowly, as it were regretfully, leave the place 

 and fly away. At the bottom of this devil's 

 purse remains a heap of dead and dying, of 

 severed limbs and disjointed wing-cases, the 

 inevitable result of the frenzied orgy. Soon, 

 Wood-lice, Earwigs and Ants will arrive and 

 devour the deceased. 



What were they doing there? Were they 

 the prisoners of the flower? Had it con- 

 verted itself into a trap which allowed them 

 to enter, but prevented them from escaping, 

 by means of a fence of converging hairs? 

 No, they were not prisoners; they had full 

 liberty to go away, as is shown by the final 

 exodus, which is effected without impedi- 

 ment. Deceived by a false odour, were they 

 doing their best to instal their eggs, as they 

 would have done under a corpse? Not that 

 either. There is no trace of an attempt at 

 egg-laying in the dragon's purse. They came, 

 enticed by the smell of a dead body, their su- 

 preme delight; they were drunk with corpse; 



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