The Vegetarian Insects 



into which the egg sinks half-way. This 

 precaution succeeds admirably. 



In a few days the eggs hatch without 

 falling off, each at the spot decided by the 

 point of my penknife. I watch in amaze- 

 ment the first wriggles of the feeble little 

 creature's body, the first strokes of its plane, 

 as it attacks the thankless material, the bark 

 and the wood, still dragging its white egg- 

 shell behind it. By the following day, each 

 grub has disappeared beneath a fine sawdust, 

 the result of the work accomplished. The 

 mound is still very small, matching the weak- 

 ness of the excavator. Let us leave the grub 

 at work. For a fortnight we see the mound 

 grow bigger and bigger, until it is almost the 

 size of a pinch of snuff. Then everything 

 stops. The amount of sawdust does not in- 

 crease, except in the oak-billet. 



This activity at the outset, which is every- 

 where the same, in media differing so greatly 

 in aroma and flavour, would lead us to sup- 

 pose, at first thoughts, that the young Cer- 

 ambyx is endowed with a highly complaisant 

 stomach and can feed on the fig-tree, oozing 

 with acrid milk, the laurel, aromatic with 

 essential oils, and the pine, saturated with 

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