第15章 A DANGEROUS DIET(2)

Does not this remnant of tenacious vitality in itself show that the organs of primary importance are the last to be attacked? Does it not prove that there is a progressive dismemberment passing from the less essential to the indispensable?

Would you like to see what becomes of a Cetonia-larva when the organism is wounded in its vital centres at the very beginning? The experiment is an easy one; and I made a point of trying it. A sewing-needle, first softened and flattened into a blade, then retempered and sharpened, gives me a most delicate scalpel. With this instrument I make a fine incision, through which I remove the mass of nerves whose remarkable structure we shall soon have occasion to study. The thing is done: the wound, which does not look serious, has left the creature a corpse, a real corpse. I lay my victim on a bed of moist earth, in a jar with a glass lid; in fact, I establish it in the same conditions as those of the larvae on which the Scoliae feed. By the next day, without changing shape, it has turned a repulsive brown;presently it dissolves into noisome putrescence. On the same bed of earth, under the same glass cover, in the same moist, warm atmosphere, the larvae three-quarters eaten by the Scoliae retain, on the contrary, the appearance of healthy flesh.

If a single stroke of my dagger, fashioned from the point of a needle, results in immediate death and early putrefaction; if the repeated bites of the Scolia gut the creature's body and reduce it almost to a skin without completely killing it, the striking contrast between these two results must be due to the relative importance of the organs injured. I destroy the nerve-centres and inevitably kill my larva, which is putrid by the following day; the Scolia attacks the reserves of fat, the blood, the muscles and does not kill its victim, which will provide it with wholesome food until the end. But it is clear that, if the Scolia were to set to work as I did, there would be nothing left, after the first few bites, but an actual corpse, discharging fluids which would be fatal to it within twenty-four hours. The mother, it is true, in order to assure the immobility of her prey, has injected the poison of her sting into the nerve-centres. Her operation cannot be compared with mine in any respect. She practises the method of the skilful physiologist who induces anaesthesia; I go to work like the butcher who chops, cuts and disembowels. The sting leaves the nerve-centres intact. Deprived of sensibility by the poison, they have lost the power of provoking muscular contractions; but who can say that, numbed as they are, they no longer serve to maintain a faint vitality? The flame is extinguished, but there is still a glowing speck upon the wick. I, a rough blunderer, do more than blow out the lamp: I throw away the wick and all is over. The grub would do the same if it bit straight into the mass of nerves.

Everything confirms the fact: the Scolia and the other Hunting Wasps whose provisions consist of bulky heads of game are gifted with a special art of eating, an exquisitely delicate art which saves a remnant of life in the prey devoured, until it is all consumed. When the prey is a small one, this precaution is superfluous. Consider, for instance, the Bembex-grubs in the midst of their heap of Flies. The prey seized upon is broached on the back, the belly, the head, the thorax, indifferently. The larva munches a given spot, which it leaves to munch a second, passing to a third and a fourth, at the bidding of its changing whims. It seems to taste and select, by repeated trials, the mouthfuls most to its liking. Thus bitton at several points, covered with wounds, the Fly is soon a shapeless mass which would putrefy very quickly if the meagre dish were not devoured at a single meal.

Allow the Scolia-grub the same unlicensed gluttony: it would perish beside its corpulent victim, which should have kept fresh for a fortnight, but which almost from the beginning would be no more than a filthy putrescence.

This art of careful eating does not seem easy to practise: at least, the larva, if ever so little diverted from its usual courses, is no longer able to apply its talent as a capable trencherman. This will be proved by experiment. I must begin by observing that, when I spoke of my larva which turned putrid within twenty-four hours, I adopted an extreme case for the sake of greater clearness. The Scolia, taking its first bite, does not and cannot go to such lengths. Nevertheless it behooves us to enquire whether, in the consumption of the victuals, the initial point of attack is a matter of indifference and whether the rummaging through the entrails of the victim entails a determined order, without which success is uncertain or even impossible. To these delicate questions no one, I think, can reply.

Where science is silent, perhaps the grub will speak. We will try.

I move from its position a Scolia-grub which has attained a quarter or a third of its full growth. The long neck plunged into the victim's belly is rather difficult to extract, because of the need of molesting the creature as little as possible. I succeed, by means of a little patience and repeated strokes with the tip of a paint-brush. I now turn the Cetonia-larva over, back uppermost, at the bottom of the little hollow made by pressing my finger in the layer of mould. Lastly, I place the Scolia on its victim's back. Here is my grub under the same conditions as just now, with this difference, that the back and not the belly of its victim is presented to its mandibles.

I watch it for a whole afternoon. It writhes about; it moves its little head now in this direction, now in that, frequently laying it on the Cetonia, but without fixing it anywhere. The day draws to a close; and still it has accomplished nothing. There are restless movements, nothing more. Hunger, I tell myself, will eventually induce it to bite. I am wrong.