Social Life in the Insect World

by Jean-Henri Fabre

The Monk is not a common butterfly which can be caught by any one who takes out a net at the proper season. I have never seen it around our village or in the solitude of my grounds during a residence of twenty years. It is true that I am not a fervent butterfly-catcher; the dead insect of the collector's cabinet has little interest for me; I must have it living, in the exercise of its functions. But although I have not the collector's zeal I have an attentive eye to all that flies or crawls in the fields. A butterfly so remarkable for its size and colouring would never have escaped my notice had I encountered it.

The little searcher whom I had enticed by a promise of rides upon wooden horses never made a second find. For three years I requisitioned friends and neighbours, and especially their children, sharp-sighted snappers-up of trifles; I myself hunted often under heaps of withered leaves; I inspected stone-heaps and visited hollow tree-trunks. Useless pains; the precious cocoon was not to be found. It is enough to say that the Banded Monk is extremely rare in my neighbourhood. The importance of this fact will presently appear.

As I suspected, my cocoon was truly that of the celebrated Oak Eggar. On the 20th of August a female emerged from it: corpulent, big-bellied, coloured like the male, but lighter in hue. I placed her under the usual wire cover in the centre of my laboratory table, littered as it was with books, bottles, trays, boxes, test-tubes, and other apparatus. I have explained the situation in speaking of the Great Peacock. Two windows light the room, both opening on the garden. One was closed, the other open day and night. The butterfly was placed in the shade, between the lines of the two windows, at a distance of 12 or 15 feet.

The rest of that day and the next went by without any occurrence worthy of notice. Hanging by the feet to the front of the wire cover, on the side nearest to the light, the prisoner was motionless, inert. There was no oscillation of the wings, no tremor of the antennæ, the female of the Great Peacock behaved in a similar fashion.

The female Bombyx gradually matured, her tender tissues gradually becoming firmer. By some process of which our scientists have not the least idea she elaborated a mysterious lure which would bring her lovers from the four corners of the sky. What was happening in this big-bellied body; what transmutations were accomplished, thus to affect the whole countryside?

On the third day the bride was ready. The festival opened brilliantly. I was in the garden, already despairing of success, for the days were passing and nothing had occurred, when towards three in the afternoon, the weather being very hot and the sun radiant, I perceived a crowd of butterflies gyrating in the embrasure of the open window.

The lovers had at last come to visit their lady. Some were emerging from the room, others were entering it; others, clinging to the wall of the house, were resting as though exhausted by a long journey. I could see others approaching in the distance, flying over the walls, over the screens of cypress. They came from all directions, but at last with decreasing frequency. I had missed the opening of the convocation, and now the gathering was almost complete.

I went indoors and upstairs. This time, in full daylight and without losing a detail, I witnessed once more the astonishing spectacle to which the great nocturnal butterfly had first introduced me. The study contained a cloud of males, which I estimated, at a glance, as being about sixty in number, so far as the movement and confusion allowed me to count them at all. After circling a few times over the cage many of them went to the open window, but returned immediately to recommence their evolutions. The most eager alighted on the cover, trampling on one another, jostling one another, trying to get the best places. On the other side of the barrier the captive, her great body hanging against the wire, waited immovable. She betrayed not a sign of emotion in the face of this turbulent swarm.

Going and entering, perched on the cover or fluttering round the room, for more than three hours they continued their frenzied saraband. But the sun was sinking, and the temperature was slowly falling. The ardour of the butterflies also cooled. Many went out not to return. Others took up their positions to wait for the gaieties of the following day; they clung to the cross-bars of the closed window as the males of the Great Peacock had done. The rejoicings were over for the day. They would certainly be renewed on the morrow, since the courtship was without result on account of the barrier of the wire-gauze cover.

But, alas I to my great disappointment, they were not resumed, and the fault was mine. Late in the day a Praying Mantis was brought to me, which merited attention on account of its exceptionally small size. Preoccupied with the events of the afternoon, and absent-minded, I hastily placed the predatory insect under the same cover as the moth. It did not occur to me for a moment that this cohabitation could lead to any harm. The Mantis was so slender, and the other so corpulent!