46 EDGE OF THE JUNGLE 
just as the skilful jiu-jitsu wrestler accomplishes 
his purpose with the aid of his opponent’s 
strength. The insect and plant were, however, 
far more intricately related than any two human 
competitors: for the grub in turn required the 
continued health and strength of the plant for its 
existence; and when I plucked a leaf, I knew I 
had doomed all the hidden insects living within 
its substance. : 
The galls at my hand simulated little acorns, 
dull greenish in color, matching the leaf-surface 
on which they rested, and rising in a sharp point. 
I cut one through and, when wearied and fretted 
with the responsibilities of independent existence, 
I know I shall often recall and envy my grub in 
his palatial parasitic home. Outside came a 
rather hard, brown protective sheath; then the 
main body of the gall, of firm and dense tissue; 
and finally, at the heart, like the Queen’s cham- 
ber in Cheops, the irregular little dwelling-place 
of the grub. This was not empty and barren; 
but the blackness and silence of this vegetable 
chamber, this architecture fashioned by the 
strangest of builders for the most remarkable of 
tenants, was filled with a nap of long, crystalline 
hairs or threads like the spun-glass candy in our 
