d soon have
nothing before it but a heap of putrescence. The Scolia, in its turn,
is familiar with the method of eating the Cetonia-grub, its invariable
portion; but it does not understand the art of eating the Ephippiger,
though the dish is to its taste. Unable to dissect this unknown species
of game, its mandibles slash away at random, killing the creature
outright as soon as they take their first bites of the deeper tissues of
the victim. That is the whole secret.

One more word, on which I shall enlarge in another chapter. I observe
that the Scoliae to which I give Ephippigers paralysed by the Sphex
keep in excellent condition, despite the change of diet, so long as
the provisions retain their freshness. They languish when the game goes
high; and they die when putridity supervenes. Their death, therefore,
is due not to an unaccustomed diet, but to poisoning by one or other
of those terrible toxins which are engendered by animal corruption
and which chemistry calls by the name of ptomaines. Therefore,
notwithstanding the fatal outcome of my three attempts, I remain
persuaded that the unfamiliar method of rearing would have been
perfectly successful had the Ephippigers not gone bad, that is, if the
Scoliae had known how to eat them according to the rules.

What a delicate and dangerous thing is the art of eating in these
carnivorous larvae supplied with a single victim, which they have to
spend a fortnight in consuming, on the express condition of not killing
it until the very end! Could our physiological science, of which, with
good reason, we are so proud, describe, without blundering, the method
to be followed in the successive mouthfuls? How has a miserable grub
learnt what our knowledge cannot tell us? By habit, the Darwinians will
reply, who see in instinct an acquired habit.

Before deciding this serious matter, I will ask you to reflect that the
first Wasp, of whatever kind, that thought of feeding her progeny on
a Cetonia-grub or on any other large piece of game demanding long
preservation could necessarily have left no descendants unless the art
of consuming food without causing putrescence had been practised, with
all its scrupulous caution, from the first generation onwards. Having as
yet learnt nothing by habit or by atavistic transmission, since it was
making a first beginning, the nurseling would bite into its provender at
random. It would be starving, it would have no respect for its prey.
It would