The Great Cerceris 29 



and, in spite of yourself, you are every moment 

 expecting to see the insect move and walk. 

 Nay more : in a heat which, in a few hours, 

 would have dried and pulverized insects that 

 had died an ordinary death, or in damp weather, 

 which would just as quickly have made them 

 decay and go mouldy, I have kept the same 

 specimens, both in glass tubes and paper bags, 

 for more than a month, without precautions of 

 any kind ; and, incredible though it may sound, 

 after this enormous lapse of time the viscera had 

 lost none of their freshness and dissection was 

 as easily performed as though I were operating 

 on a live insect. No, in the presence of such 

 facts, we cannot speak of the action of an anti- 

 septic and believe in a real death : life is still 

 there, latent, passive life, the life of a vegetable. 

 It alone, resisting yet a little while longer the 

 all-conquering chemical forces, can thus pre- 

 serve the structure from decomposition. Life 

 is still there, except for movement ; and we 

 have before our eyes a marvel such as chloro- 

 form or ether might produce, a marvel which 

 owes its origin to the mysterious laws of the 

 nervous system. 



The functions of this vegetative life are no 

 doubt enfeebled and disturbed ; but at any 

 rate they are exercised in a lethargic fashion. 

 I have as a proof the evacuation performed 



