106 THE LIFE AND LOVE OF THE INSECT 



hair and down, crushed ossicles, strips of flesh and skin. 

 Now hard as brick, the thickening of that mince was 

 originally a jelly of fine clay soaked in the juice of cor- 

 ruption. Lastly, the puff-paste crust of our vol-au-vent 

 is here represented by a covering of the same clay, less 

 rich in extract of meat than the other. 



The pastry-cook gives his pie an elegant shape ; he 

 decorates it with rosettes, with twists, with scrolls. 

 Phanseus Milo is no stranger to these culinary aesthetics. 

 He turns the crust of his vol-au-vent into a handsome 

 gourd, ornamented with a finger-print guilloche. 



The outer covering, a disagreeable crust, insufficiently 

 steeped in savoury juices, is not, we can easily guess, 

 intended for consumption. It is possible that, somewhat 

 later, when the stomach becomes robust and is not 

 repelled by coarse fare, the grub scrapes a little from the 

 wall of its pie ; but, taken as a whole, until the adult 

 insect emerges, the calabash remains intact, having acted as 

 a safeguard of the freshness of the mince-meat at first and 

 as a protecting box for the recluse from start to finish. 



Above the cold pasty, right at the base of the neck of 

 the gourd, is contrived a round cell with a clay wall con- 

 tinuing the general wall. A fairly thick floor, made of the 

 same material, separates it from the store-room. It 

 is the hatching-chamber. Here is laid the egg, which I 

 find in its place, but dried up ; here is hatched the worm, 

 which, to reach the nourishing ball, must previously 

 open a trap-door through the partition separating the two 

 storeys. 



The worm is born in a little box surmounting the 

 nourishing pile, but not communicating with it. The 

 budding grub must, therefore, at the opportune moment, 

 itself pierce the covering of the pot of preserves. As a 



