Lastly, let us add that the Ammophila’s egg is invariably laid on the ring that has been rendered insensible. Here and here alone the young larva can bite without provoking dangerous contortions; where a needle-prick has no effect, the grub’s bite will have no effect either. The grub will thus remain motionless until the nurseling has gained strength and can forge ahead without running a risk.
In my later researches, as the number of my observations increased, I began to entertain doubts, not as to the conclusions which I had formed, but as to their general application. That feeble Loopers and other small caterpillars are rendered harmless by a single thrust, especially when the sting strikes the favourable spot described, is a thing quite probable in itself and one which can also be proved either [[247]]by direct observation or by testing the insect’s sensibility with a needle. But the Sandy Ammophila and especially the Hairy Ammophila capture enormous victims, whose weight, as I have said, is fifteen times that of the kidnapper. Will this giant prey be treated in the same manner as the frail Measuring-worm? Will one dagger-thrust be sufficient to subdue the monster and render it incapable of doing harm? Will the horrid Grey Worm, lashing the walls of the cell with its powerful tail, not endanger either the egg or the little grub? We dare not picture the encounter, in the narrow cell of the burrow, between those two—the feeble, new-hatched creature and that dragony thing still possessing freedom in its movements to twist and untwist its tortuous coils.
My suspicions were confirmed by an examination of the caterpillar from the point of view of sensibility. Whereas the small game of the Silky Ammophila and the Silvery Ammophila struggle violently if the needle touches them elsewhere than in the ring stung by the Wasp, the big caterpillars of the Sandy Ammophila and especially of the Hairy Ammophila remain motionless, no matter which segment we prick. With them there are no contortions, no sudden twists of the hinder parts; the steel point produces no sign of a remnant of sensibility [[248]]beyond a faint quivering of the skin. The power of moving and feeling is therefore almost wholly abolished, as it needs must be if the grub is to feed in safety on this monstrous prey. Before placing it in the burrow, the Wasp has turned it into an inert though still living mass.
I have been permitted to watch the Ammophila operating with her scalpel on the sturdy caterpillar, and never did the intuitive science of instinct show me anything more exciting. With a friend—soon, alas, to be snatched from me by death!—I was coming back from the plateau of Les Angles to lay snares for the Sacred Beetle and put his skill to the test, when we caught sight of a Hairy Ammophila very busily employed at the foot of a tuft of thyme. We at once lay down on the ground, close to where she was working. Our presence did not frighten the Wasp; in fact, she came and settled on my sleeve for a moment, decided that her two visitors were harmless, since they did not move, and returned to her tuft of thyme. As an old stager, I knew what that daring familiarity meant: the Wasp’s attention was occupied with a serious business. We would wait and see.
The Ammophila scratched the ground at the foot of the plant, at the junction of root and [[249]]stem, pulled up slender grass rootlets and poked her head under the little clods which she had lifted. She ran hurriedly this way and that around the thyme, inspecting every crevice that could give access to what lay below. She was not digging herself a home but hunting some game hidden underground; this was evident from her behaviour, which resembled that of a Dog trying to dig a Rabbit out of his hole. Presently, excited by what was happening overhead and close-pressed by the Ammophila, a big Grey Worm made up his mind to leave his lair and come up to the light of day. That settled him; the huntress was on the spot at once, gripping him by the skin of his neck and holding tight in spite of his contortions. Perched on the monster’s back, the Wasp bent her abdomen and deliberately, without hurrying, like a surgeon thoroughly acquainted with his patient’s anatomy, drove her lancet into the ventral surface of each of the victim’s segments, from the first to the last. Not a ring was left without receiving a stab; all, whether with legs or without, were dealt with in order, from front to back.
That is what I saw with all the leisure and ease that an observation needs in order to be above reproach. The Wasp acts with a precision that would make science turn green with [[250]]envy; she knows what man hardly ever knows; she knows her victim’s complex nervous system and reserves her successive dagger-thrusts for the successive ganglia of her caterpillar. I said, she knows; what I should say is, she behaves as though she knew. Her act is simple inspiration. Animals obey their compelling instinct, without realizing what they do. But whence comes that sublime inspiration? Can theories of atavism, of natural selection, of the struggle for life interpret it reasonably? To me and my friend, this was and remained one of the most eloquent revelations of the unutterable logic that rules the world and guides the ignorant by the laws of its inspiration. Stirred to our innermost being by this flash of truth, both of us felt tears of undefinable emotion spring to our eyes. [[251]]
[1] The caterpillars of the Geometræ, or Geometrid Moths, are called also Inchworms, Spanworms and Surveyors.—Translator’s Note. [↑]