This evening in the village they are celebrating the National Festival.[7] While the little boys and girls are hopping around a bonfire whose gleams are reflected upon the church-steeple, while the drum is banged to mark the ascent of each rocket, I am sitting alone in a dark corner, in the comparative coolness that prevails at nine o’clock, harking to the concert of the festival of the fields, the festival of the harvest, grander by far than that which, at this moment, is being celebrated [[241]]in the village square with gunpowder, lighted torches, Chinese lanterns, and, above all, strong drink. It has the simplicity of beauty and the repose of strength.
It is late; and the Cicadæ are silent. Glutted with light and heat, they have indulged in symphonies all the livelong day. It is now the time of the nocturnal performers. Hard by the place of slaughter, in the green bushes, a delicate ear perceives the hum of the Grasshoppers. It is the sort of noise that a spinning-wheel makes, a very unobtrusive sound, a vague rustle of dry membranes rubbed together. Above this dull bass there rises, at intervals, a hurried, very shrill, almost metallic clicking. There you have the air and the recitative, interspersed with pauses. The rest is the accompaniment.
Despite the assistance of a bass, it is a poor concert, very poor indeed, though there are about ten executants in my immediate vicinity. The tone lacks intensity. My old tympanum is not always capable of perceiving these subtleties of sound. The little that reaches me is extremely sweet and most appropriate to the calm of twilight. Just a little more breadth in your bow-stroke, my dear Green Grasshopper, and your technique would be better than the hoarse Cicada’s, whose name and reputation you have been made to usurp in the countries of the north.
Still, you will never equal your neighbour, the little bell-ringing Toad, who goes tinkling all around, at the foot of the plane-trees, while you [[242]]click up above. He is the smallest of my batrachian folk and the most venturesome in his expeditions.
How often, at nightfall, by the last glimmers of daylight, have I not come upon him as I wandered through my garden, hunting for ideas! Something runs away, rolling over and over in front of me. Is it a dead leaf blown along by the wind? No, it is the pretty little Toad disturbed in the midst of his pilgrimage. He hurriedly takes shelter under a stone, a clod of earth, a tuft of grass, recovers from his excitement and loses no time in picking up his liquid note.
On this evening of national merry-making there are nearly a dozen of him tinkling one against the other around me. Most of them are squatting among the rows of flower-pots that form a sort of lobby outside my house. Each has his own note, always the same, lower in one case, higher in another, a short, clear note, melodious and of exquisite purity.
With their slow, rhythmical cadence, they seem to be intoning litanies. Cluck, says one; click, responds another, on a finer note; clock, adds a third, the tenor of the band. And this is repeated indefinitely, like the bells of the village pealing on a holiday: cluck, click, clock! cluck, click, clock!
As a song this litany has neither head nor tail to it; as a collection of pure sounds, it is delicious.[8]
[[243]]
“A little animated clay, capable of pleasure and pain.” To the scrutiny of this miracle, with its infinity of forms, Fabre devotes himself with touching sympathy and indefatigable activity. He dedicates his day to it; and at night he is still working. And in this work, which seems to admit of no relaxation, he appears to know nothing of fatigue. The love of his task upholds him and inspires him. When night has fallen, the observer has still one resource left; he can listen for the rustle or the song of the insect that has so far escaped him in its coming and going. We might, perhaps, have discovered the insect, but he discovers something very different. He makes a series of observations by the light of a lantern in the brushwood or before the apparatus in the harmas.
During the two hottest months, when the darkness is profound and a little coolness follows the furnace of the day, it is easy for me, with a lantern in my hand, to watch that magnificent Spider, the Epeira, in the manufacture of her web. She has established herself at a height convenient for observation, between a row of cypress-trees and a thicket of laurels, at the entrance of a path frequented by nocturnal moths. The situation, it seems, is a good one, for the Epeira does not change it all [[244]]the season, although she renews her net almost every night.
When twilight is over, we punctually set out to pay her a family visit. Old and young alike are amazed by her gyrations in the midst of her quivering cordage, and we marvel at her impeccable geometry as her web takes shape. Gleaming in the rays of the lantern, the fabric becomes a fairy rose-window which seems to be woven of moon-beams.
What a pity that we cannot wait for the completion of a task so artistically begun! But the hour is late, and we have still to pay a visit to the Languedocian Scorpion, a lover of darkness who has his own hours for going abroad and rarely shows himself save at night. Accordingly, it has taken time to secure the last word of his history.
Rearing the Scorpion in a breeding-cage will perhaps give better results, and in any case will facilitate nocturnal observations which alone may shed a little light on the obscure habits of this unsociable hermit.
Interrogated by lantern-light, the Arachnoid will indeed tell us more during a few seconds of stealthy inspection than during days and weeks of diurnal hunting. His operations are, as a matter of fact, such as call for closed doors, and would rightly [[245]]shrink from displaying themselves in broad daylight.
I have prepared beforehand the great glass cage, peopled with twenty-five inhabitants, each with his tile. Every night, from the middle of April, as darkness falls, there is great animation in the glass palace. By day seemingly to be deserted, it becomes a cheerful scene. Hardly is supper finished when the whole household hastens thither. A lantern hung upon the glazed window enables us to follow what happens. This is our distraction after the bustle of the day; it is like a visit to the theatre. And in this theatre the plays are so interesting that, as soon as the lantern is lit, all of us, old and young, come to take our places in the stalls; even down to Tom, the house-dog. Indifferent to the affairs of the Scorpions, like the true philosopher that he is, Tom lies at our feet and sleeps, but only with one eye, the other being always open upon his friends, the children.
Close to the glass panes, in the region discreetly lit by the lantern, a numerous assembly has presently gathered together. Some come from a distance; they solemnly emerge from the shadow, and then, suddenly, with a swift easy rush like a slide, they join the crowd in the light. They investigate their surroundings, fleeing precipitately at a touch as though they had burned each other. Others, having mixed with their comrades a little, suddenly make off distractedly; they recover themselves in [[246]]the darkness and return. At moments there is a violent tumult; a confused mass of swarming legs, snapping pincers and coiling, clashing tails, threatening or caressing, one does not quite know which. All take part in the scuffle, large and small; you would think it a deadly battle, a general massacre, but it is only a crazy game, like a scrimmage of kittens. Presently the group disperses; they retire for a little in all directions, without any sign of a wound, without a sprain.[9]
What do you think of the saraband of these horrible creatures, so full of mirth and playfulness? Certainly it has its fascinating side; but it is not equal to the scenes of betrothal and espousal.
Now the fugitives are once more assembled beneath the lantern. They pass to and fro, coming and going, often meeting face to face. The one in the greatest hurry walks over the other’s back, who allows him to do so without other protest than a movement of the rump. The time has not come for squabbling; at the most those encountering exchange the equivalent of a punch on the head: that is, a thump of the tail.
We have something better here than entangled legs and brandished tails; these are pauses of great originality. Face to face, the claws drawn back, [[247]]two combatants proceed to stand on their heads: that is, supporting themselves only on the fore part of the body, they raise the hinder part in the air, so high that the thorax reveals the eight white breathing-pockets. The tails, stretched out in a straight line and raised into a vertical position, rub together, slipping over each other, while their extremities are bent into a hook and gently, over and over again, knot themselves together and release themselves. Suddenly the amicable pyramid falls to the ground and each scuttles off without further ceremony.
What did these two wrestlers intend by their original posture? Was it the grappling of two rivals? It would seem not, so pacific was the encounter. Subsequent observations tell me that these are the allurements of the betrothal. To declare his passion, the Scorpion stands on his head.[10]