The Burying-Beetles : Experiments 



brick already tells us something. For six 

 hours my three specimens exhausted them- 

 selves in 'efforts before they succeeded in re- 

 moving their booty and placing it on prac- 

 ticable soil. In this long and heavy job, 

 helpful neighbours would have been most 

 welcome. Four other Necrophori, buried 

 here and there under a little sand, comrades 

 and acquaintances, fellow-workers of the day 

 before, were occupying the same cage; and 

 not one of the busy ones thought of calling 

 on them to assist. Despite their extreme 

 embarrassment, the owners of the Mouse 

 accomplished their task to the end, without 

 the least help, though this could have been 

 so easily requisitioned. 



Being three, one might say, they deemed 

 themselves strong enough ; they needed no 

 one else to lend them a hand. The objection 

 does not hold good. On many occasions and 

 under conditions even more difficult than 

 those presented by a hard soil, I have again 

 and again seen isolated Necrophori wearing 

 themselves out against my artifices; yet not 

 once did they leave their workshop to recruit 

 helpers. Collaborators, it is true, often ar- 

 rive, but they are summoned by their sense 

 of smell, not by the first occupant. They 

 are fortuitous helpers; they are never called 

 327 



