UNDER THE APPLE-TREES 



female, though often with obvious signs of hesitancy 

 and trepidation. Love overcomes the lover's fear 

 of the ferocious jaws of his mistress. The same is 

 true of the praying-mantis and the scorpion, as 

 portrayed by the inimitable Fabre. After hours or 

 days of love and nuptial bliss, the female turns and 

 slays her lover, and makes a meal off him. The 

 human, or, rather, inhuman, Bluebeard is matched 

 on the other side of the house. Love and martyrdom 

 go hand in hand with honey-bees, spiders, and scor- 

 pions. Eating up your mate is certainly a simple 

 and primitive way out of matrimonial difficulties. 



Is it not probable that in all such cases the female 

 obtains some nutritive element, maybe in minute 

 quantities, from the body of the male that is neces- 

 sary for the complete development of her young? 

 The purpose of Nature must be served in some way 

 in such a tragedy, as it is when certain species eat 

 the placenta and when the toad devours his cast-off 

 skin. 



Weismann has suggested that the bodies of an- 

 imals are but appendages to the immortal chain of 

 sex cells — they are only the vessels in which the 

 precious germs are nourished and conveyed, the 

 body bearing the relation to them of host to para- 

 site. 



So solicitous is Nature for the well-being of the 

 offspring that she will rob the mother's body, if 

 insufficiently nourished, to feed the baby she is car- 

 80 



