The Life of the Grasshopper 



the Flea does the Dog. But to touch an- 

 other's grass — you know it: doesn't the fable 

 say so? — is a heinous crime, an offence which 

 can be punished by nothing less drastic than 

 boiling water. 



Let us waste no more time on these agri- 

 cultural entomologists with their murderous 

 designs. To hear them talk, one would 

 think that the insect has no right to live. 

 Incapable of behaving like a ferocious land- 

 owner who becomes filled with thoughts of 

 massacre at the sight of a maggoty plum, I, 

 more kindly, abandon my few rows of peas 

 and beans to the Cicadella : she will leave 

 me my share, I am convinced. 



Besides, the insignificant ones of the earth 

 are not the least rich in talent, in an orig- 

 inality of invention which will teach us much 

 concerning the infinite variety of instinct. 

 The Cicadella, in particular, possesses her 

 recipes for aerated waters. Let us ask her 

 by what process she succeeds in giving such 

 a fine head of froth to her product, for the 

 books that talk about boiling cauldrons and 

 Cuckoo-spit are silent on this subject, the 

 only one worthy of narration. 



The foamy mass has no very definite shape 

 and is hardly larger than a hazel-nut. It is 



428 



