THE SPANISH COPRIS 75 



group of pills, in each of which a grub, now nearing its 

 complete development, feasts on the fat of the land. 



My dark apparatus, flower-pots filled with fresh sand, 

 confirm what the fields have taught me. Buried with 

 provisions in the first fortnight in May, the mothers do 

 not reappear on the surface, under the glass lid. They 

 keep hidden in the burrow after laying their eggs ; they 

 spend the sultry dog-days with their ovoids, watching 

 them, no doubt, as the glass jars, rid of subterranean 

 mysteries, tell us. 



They come up again at the time of the first autumnal 

 rains, in September. But by then the new generation 

 has attained its perfect form. The mother, therefore, 

 enjoys underground that rare privilege for the insect, 

 the delight of knowing her family ; she hears her sons 

 scratching at the shell to obtain their liberty ; she is 

 present at the bursting of the casket which she has 

 fashioned so conscientiously ; maybe she helps the ex- 

 hausted weakhngs, if the ground have not been cool 

 enough to soften their cells. Mother and progeny leave 

 the subsoil together and arrive together at the autumn 

 banquets, when the sun is mild and the ovine manna 

 plentiful along the paths. 



