wo healthy specimens from my menagerie and place them together
at the bottom of a glass jar on a layer of sand. Excited with the tip
of a straw which brings them face to face again whenever they draw
back, the two harassed creatures decide on mortal combat. Each no
doubt attributes to the other the annoyances of which I myself am the
cause. The claws, those weapons of defence, are displayed in a
semicircle and open to keep the adversary at a distance; the tails, in
sudden jerks, are flung forward above the back; the poison-phials
clash together; a tiny drop, limpid as water, beads the point of the
sting.

The fight does not last long. One of the Scorpions receives the full
force of the other's poisoned weapon. It is all over: in a few minutes
the wounded one succumbs. The victor very calmly proceeds to gnaw the
fore-part of the victim's cephalothorax, or, in less crabbed terms,
the bit at which we look for a head and find only the entrance to a
belly. The mouthfuls are small, but long-drawn-out. For four or five
days, almost without a break, the cannibal nibbles at his murdered
comrade. To eat the vanquished, that's good warfare, the only sort
excusable. What I do not understand, nor shall until we tin the meat
on the battle-field for food, is our wars between nations.

We now have authentic information: the Scorpion's sting is fatal,
promptly fatal, to the Scorpion himself. Let us come to the matter of
suicide, such as it has been described to us. When surrounded by a
circle of live embers, the animal, so we are told, stabs itself with
its sting and finds an end of its torment in voluntary death. This
would be very fine on the creature's part if it were true. We shall
see.

In the centre of a ring of burning charcoal, I place the largest
specimen from my menagerie. The bellows increase the glow. At the
first smart of the heat, the animal moves backwards within the circle
of fire. It collides by inadvertence with the burning barrier. Now
follows a disorderly retreat, in every direction, at random, renewing
the agonizing contact. At each attempt to escape, the burning is
repeated more severely than before. The animal becomes frantic. It
darts forward and scorches itself. In a desperate frenzy, it
brandishes its weapon, crooks it, straightens it, lays it down flat
and raises it again, all with such disorderly haste that I am quite
unable to follow its movements accurately.

The moment ought to have come for the Scorp