THE ADVENTURES OF A GRUB 117 



in safety : the honey that surrounds it is too dangerous. If 

 one of them by chance approaches the honey, it tries to escape 

 as soon as it sees the sticky nature of the stuff under its feet. 

 It often ends by falling back into the cell, where it dies of 

 suffocation. It is therefore certain that the grub does not 

 leave the fleece of the Bee when the latter is in her cell or 

 near it, in order to make a rush for the honey ; for this honey 

 would inevitably cause its death, if it so much as touched 

 the surface. 



We must remember that the young Sitaris which is found 

 in a closed cell is always placed on the egg of the Bee. This 

 egg not only serves as a raft for the tiny creature floating on 

 a very treacherous lake, but also provides it with its first 

 meal. To get at this egg, in the centre of the lake of honey, 

 to reach this raft which is also its first food, the young grub 

 must somehow contrive to avoid the fatal touch of the honey. 



There is only one way in which this can be done. The 

 clever grub, at the very moment when the Bee is laying her 

 egg, slips off the Bee and on to the egg, and with it reaches 

 the surface of the honey. The egg is too small to hold more 

 than one grub, and that is why we never find more than one 

 Sitaris in a cell. Such a performance on the part of a grub 

 seems extraordinarily inspired but then the study of instincts 

 constantly gives us examples of such inspiration. 



When dropping her egg upon the honey, then, the Antho- 

 phora at the same time drops into her cell the mortal enemy 

 of her race. She carefully plasters the lid which closes the 

 entrance to the cell, and all is done. A second cell is built 

 beside it, probably to suffer the same fate ; and so on until 

 all the parasites sheltered by her fleece are comfortably 

 housed. Let us leave the unhappy mother to continue her 

 fruitless task, and turn our attention to the young larva 

 which has so cleverly secured for itself board and lodging. 



Let us suppose that we remove the lid from a cell in which 

 the egg, recently laid, supports a Sitaris-grub. The egg is 

 intact and in perfect condition. But now the work of destruc- 



