If I rear it in a glass tube with a piece of its native artichoke, I see it from time to time curving itself into a ring and gathering with its teeth a drop of a whitish, sticky substance which the hinder part of the grub sparingly provides. The glue is instantly spread hither and thither, swiftly, for it sets quickly. Thus the hairy particles are [[53]]bound together and what was flimsy felt becomes a solid fabric.
When completed, the work is a sort of turret, the base of which is contained in the little pit of the receptacle, from which the grub obtained part of its nourishment. The dense mane of untouched hairs forms a rampart above and at the sides. It is a somewhat clumsy edifice without, shored up by the adjacent fur; but it is nicely smoothed within and coated in every part with the intestinal glue, which becomes a lustrous reddish material, like a shellac varnish. The castle-keep measures one and a half centimetres in height.[1]
Towards the end of August most of the recluses are in the perfect state. Many have even burst the vaulted ceiling of their home; rostrum in air, they investigate the weather, awaiting the hour of departure. The cardoon-head by this time is quite dry upon its withered stalk. Let us strip it of its scales and, with a pair of scissors, clip its fur as closely as possible.
The result thus obtained is truly curious. It is a sort of convex brush, pierced here and there with deep cavities wide enough to admit an ordinary lead-pencil. The sides consist of a reddish-brown wall covered with incrustations of hairy débris. Each of these cavities is the cell of an adult Larinus. At first sight one would take the thing for the comb of some extraordinary Wasps’-nest. [[54]]
Let us mention a fourth member of the same group. This is the Spangled Larinus (L. conspersus, Sch.), smaller in size than the three foregoing species and more simply clad. She is sprinkled with small yellow-ochre spots on a black ground.
Her most sumptuous establishment, as far as I know, is a majestic horror to which the botanists have given the very expressive name of the prickly thistle (Cirsium ferox, D. C.). The moorlands of Provence have nothing in their flora to equal its proud and menacing aspect.
In August this fierce-looking plant raises its voluminous white tufts and with its lofty stature overtops the blue-green clumps of the lavender, that lover of stony wastes. Spread in a rosette on the level of the soil, the root-leaves, slashed into two series of narrow strips, call to mind the backbones of a heap of big fish burnt up by the sun.
These strips are split into two divergent halves, of which one points upwards and the other downwards, as though to threaten the passer-by from every angle. The whole thing, from top to bottom, is a formidable arsenal, a trophy of prickles, of pointed nails, of arrow-heads sharper than needles.
What is the use of this savage panoply? Its discordance with the usual vegetation accentuates the grace of the plants around it. By striking a harsh and dissonant note, it contributes to the general harmony. The haughty thistle is really [[55]]superb, standing like a monument amidst the humility of the lavender and thyme.
Others might see in this thicket of halberds a means of defence. But what has the fierce thistle to defend, that it should bristle in this way? Its seed? I doubt, indeed, whether the Goldfinch, the accredited pilferer of the Carduaceæ, dare set foot on this horrid arsenal. He would be spitted at once.