The Life of the Weevil 



soil, hunting for garlic, the exclusive food 

 of her larva. In my modest kitchen-garden, 

 garlic, dear to the Provence folk, has its 

 special corner. At the time when we gather 

 it, in July, most of the heads give me a mag- 

 nificent grub, fat as butter, which has dug 

 itself a large hollow in one of the cloves, only 

 one, without touching the rest. This is the 

 grub of the Brachycerus, which discovered 

 the aioli of the Provengal cooks long before 

 they did. 



Raw garlic, Raspail 1 used to say, is the 

 camphor of the poor. The camphor pos- 

 sibly, but not the bread. This paradox 

 becomes a reality in the case of our grub, 

 which is so much in love with this powerful 

 condiment that it will not eat anything else 

 its whole life long. How, with this fiery 

 diet, does it put on such fine layers of fat? 

 That is its secret; and there is room for 

 every sort of taste in this world of ours. 



After eating its clove, this lover of garlic 

 dives deeper into the soil, fearing perhaps 

 the lifting of the bulbs, the time for which 



1 Francois Vincent Raspail (1794-1878), a French 

 physician and politician, one of the early advocates of 

 universal suffrage. Translator's Note. 

 170 



