The Elephant Weevil 
in one acorn would mean an ascent in 
another. 
A second, no less risky explanation sug- 
gests itself. You say to yourself: 
“The Cuckoo lays her egg in the grass, 
anywhere; she picks it up in her beak and 
goes and places it as it is in the Warbler’s 
narrow nest.” 
Can the Weevil adopt a similar method? 
Can she use her rostrum to push her egg to 
the base of the acorn? I cannot see that 
the insect has any other implement capable 
of reaching this remote hiding-place. 
And yet we must hastily reject this quaint 
explanation as a despairing resource. Never 
does the Weevil lay her egg in the open and 
then take it in her beak. If she did, the 
delicate germ would infallibly perish, 
destroyed in the attempt to push it down a 
narrow, half-choked passage. 
My perplexity is great; and it will be 
shared by any of my readers who are 
acquainted with the Weevil’s structure. The 
Grasshopper owns a sabre, a laying-tool 
which sinks into the ground and sows the 
eggs at the requisite depth; 1 the Leucospis is 
113 
