The Anthrax 



the tissues are fluidified. They empty their 

 patient, who has become a bag of running 

 grease with a diffused life ; but not one, among 

 those I know, reaches the Anthrax' perfection 

 in the art of extraction. 



Nor can any be compared with the Anthrax 

 as regards the means brought into play in 

 order to leave the cell. These others, when 

 they become perfect insects, have implements 

 for sapping and demolishing, stout mandibles, 

 capable of digging the ground, of pulling 

 down clay partition-walls and even of redu- 

 cing the Mason-bee's tough cement to powder. 

 The Anthrax, in her final form, has nothing 

 like this. Her mouth is a short, soft proboscis, 

 good at most for soberly licking the sugary 

 exudations of the flowers; her slim legs are so 

 feeble that to move a grain of sand were an 

 excessive task for them, enough to strain every 

 joint; her great, stiff wings, which must re- 

 main full-spread, do not allow her to slip 

 through a narrow passage; her delicate suit of 

 downy velvet, from which you take the bloom 

 by merely breathing on it, could not withstand 

 the rough contact of the gallery of a mine. 

 Unable herself to enter the Mason-bee's cell 

 to lay her egg, she cannot leave it either, when 

 the time comes to free herself and appear in 



53 



