The Life of the Weevil 
could very well explain her exuberant 
emission of germs on a single pod: a rich 
supply of food, easily acquired, invites a 
large colony. The pea, on the other hand, 
puzzles me. What vagary makes the 
mother abandon her offspring to starvation 
on this insufficient legumen? Why so many 
boarders gathered around a seed which forms 
the ration of one alone? 
It is not thus that matters are arranged 
in life’s general balance-sheet. A certain 
foresight rules the ovaries and makes them 
adjust the number of eaters to the abundance 
or scarcity of the thing eaten. The Sacred 
Beetle, the Sphex-wasp, the Burying-beetle 
and the other manufacturers of preserved 
provisions for the family set close limits to 
their fertility, because the soft loaves of 
their baking, the baskets containing their 
game and the contents: of their sepulchral 
retting-vat are all obtained at the cost of 
laborious and often unproductive efforts. 
The Bluebottle, on the contrary, heaps her 
eggs in bundles. ‘Trusting in the inexhaust- 
ible wealth of a corpse, she lavishes her 
maggots without counting the number. At 
other times, the provision is obtained by 
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