Through this break the back is seen, quite soft, pale, hardly tinged with grey. Slowly it swells into a larger and larger hunch. At last it is wholly released. The head follows, pulled out of its mask, which remains [[244]]in its place, intact in the smallest particular, but looking strange with its great eyes that do not see. The sheaths of the antennæ, without a wrinkle, with nothing out of order, and with their usual position unchanged, hang over this dead face, which is now half transparent.
This means that the antennæ within, although fitted into narrow sheaths that enclose them as precisely as gloves, are able to withdraw without disturbing the covers in the smallest degree, or even wrinkling them. The contents manage to slip out as easily as a smooth, straight object could slip from a loose sheath. This mechanism is even more remarkable in the case of the hind-legs.
Now it is the turn of the fore-legs and intermediary legs to shed their armlets and gauntlets, always without the least rent, however small, without a crease of rumpled material, or a trace of any change in the natural position. The insect is now fixed to the top of the cage only by the claws of the long hind-legs. It hangs perpendicularly by four tiny hooks, head downwards, and it swings like a pendulum if I touch the wire-gauze.
The wing-cases and wings now emerge. These are four narrow strips, faintly grooved and looking like bits of paper ribbon. At this stage they are scarcely a quarter of their final length. They are so limp that they bend under their own weight and sprawl along the insect’s sides in the wrong direction, with their points towards the head [[245]]of the Locust. Imagine four blades of thick grass, bent and battered by a rain-storm, and you will have a fair picture of the pitiable bunch formed by the future wings.
The hind-legs are next released. The great thighs appear, tinted on their inner surface with pale pink, which will soon turn into a streak of bright crimson. They come out of the sheath quite easily, for the thick haunch makes way for the tapering knuckle.
The shank is a different matter. The shank of the full-grown insect bristles throughout its length with a double row of hard, pointed spikes. Moreover, the lower extremity ends in four large spurs. It is a genuine saw, but with two parallel sets of teeth.
Now this awkwardly shaped skin is enclosed in a sheath that is formed in exactly the same way. Each spur is fitted into a similar spur, each tooth into the hollow of a similar tooth. And the sheath is as close and as thin as a coat of varnish.
Nevertheless the saw-like skin slips out of its long narrow case without catching in it at any point whatever. If I had not seen this happen over and over again I could never have believed it. The saw does no injury to the dainty scabbard which a puff of my breath is enough to tear; the formidable rake slips through without leaving the least scratch behind it.
One would expect that, because of the spiked armour, the envelope of the leg would strip off in scales coming [[246]]loose of themselves, or would be rubbed off like dead skin. But the reality exceeds all possible expectation. From the spurs and spikes of the infinitely thin envelope there are drawn spurs and spikes so strong that they can cut soft wood. This is done without violence, the discarded skin remains where it was, hanging by the claws to the top of the cage, uncreased and untorn. The magnifying-glass shows not a trace of rough usage.
If it were suggested that one should draw out a saw from some sort of gold-beater’s skin sheath which had been exactly moulded on the steel, and that one should perform the operation without making the least tear, one would simply laugh. The thing would be impossible. Yet Nature makes light of such impossibilities; she can realise the absurd, in case of need.