The Pelopaeus 



flutings between the cells sat back to back, 

 the corded cushions, the polished stucco — 

 all disappear under a forbidding husk. In 

 this final state, the nest is nothing more than 

 a shapeless protuberance; one would take it 

 for a great splash of mud that had been 

 flung against the wall by accident and dried 

 there. 



We find similar methods among the 

 Chalicodomae. The best mason among 

 them, after she has erected her cells on a 

 pebble, building them in the form of turrets 

 daintily encrusted with bits of gravel, buries 

 her artistic work under a clumsy plaster. 

 Why do they both give this finish and devote 

 such fastidious care to the frontage, when 

 the masterpiece is doomed to disappear, de- 

 luged in mortar? We do not build a 

 Louvre and then abandon its colonnades to 

 the unclean trowel. But we must not press 

 the analogy too far. What do insects care 

 about the beauty or ugliness of an edifice, 

 provided that the larva be comfortably 

 housed? With them we must be prepared 

 for all the inconsistencies of the unconscious 

 artist. 



83 



