The Sacred Beetle 



They are very far, however, from any such 

 cooperation. Each pushes the ball, with all 

 his might, I admit, but he pushes as if he were 

 alone and seems to have no notion of the 

 happy result that would follow a combined 

 effort. In this instance, when the ball is 

 nailed to the ground by a pin, they do exactly 

 what they do in corresponding circumstances, 

 as, for example, when the load is brought 

 to a standstill by some obstacle, caught in a 

 loop of couch-grass or transfixed by some 

 spiky bit of stalk that has run into the soft, 

 rolling mass. I produced artificially a 

 stoppage which is not really very different 

 from those occurring naturally when the ball 

 is being rolled amid the thousand and one 

 irregularities of the ground; and the Beetle 

 behaves, in my experimental tests, as he would 

 have behaved in any other circumstances in 

 which I had no part. He uses his back as 

 a wedge and a lever and pushes with his feet, 

 without introducing anything new into his 

 methods, even when he has a companion and 

 can avail himself of his assistance. 



When he is all alone in face of the 

 difficulty, when he has no assistant, his 

 dynamic operations remain absolutely the 

 same; and his efforts to move his transfixed 

 ball end in success, provided that we give 



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