Author's Preface 



port my iconoclastic assertions, on the Pla- 

 teau des Angles, near Avignon; and nothing 

 has happened to invalidate my statements; 

 far from it: everything has corroborated 

 them. The incontestable proof came at last 

 when I obtained the Scarab's nest, a genuine 

 nest this time, gathered in such quantities as 

 I wished and in some cases even shaped be- 

 fore my eyes. 



I have described my former vain attempts 

 to find the larva's abode; I have described 

 the pitiful failure of my efforts at rearing 

 under cover; and perhaps the reader com- 

 miserated my woes when he saw me on the 

 outskirts of the town stealthily and in- 

 gloriously gathering in a paper bag the 

 donation dropped by a passing Mule for my 

 charges. Certainly, as things were, my task 

 was no easy one. My boarders, who were 

 great consumers, or more correctly speaking 

 great wasters, used to beguile the tedium of 

 captivity by indulging in art for art's sake 

 in the glad sunshine. Pill followed on pill, 

 all beautifully rounded, to be abandoned un- 

 used after a few exercises in rolling. The 

 heap of provisions, which I had so painfully 

 acquired in the friendly shadow of the gloam- 

 ing, was squandered with disheartening 

 rapidity; and there came a time when the 



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