Dinner is forgotten in the presence of the wonders that are taking place. With inconceivable punctuality, the plume-wearers hasten to answer the captive’s magic call. They arrive one by one, with a tortuous flight. All of them come from the north. This detail has its significance. As a matter of fact, during the past week we have experienced a fierce return of winter. The north wind has been blowing a gale, killing the imprudent almond-blossoms. It was one of those ferocious storms which, as a rule, usher in the [[276]]spring in our part of the world. To-day the temperature has suddenly grown milder, but the wind is still blowing from the north.
Now at this first visit all the Moths hurrying to the prisoner enter the enclosure from the north; they follow the movement of the air; not one beats against it. If their compass were a sense of smell similar to our own, if they were guided by odoriferous particles dissolved in the air, they ought to arrive from the opposite direction. If they came from the south, we might believe them to be informed by effluvia carried by the wind; coming as they do from the north, through the mistral, that mighty sweeper of the atmosphere, how can we suppose them to have perceived, at a great distance, what we call a smell? This reflux of scented atoms in a direction contrary to the aerial current seems to me inadmissible.
For a couple of hours, in radiant sunshine, the visitors come and go outside the front of the study. Most of them search for a long while, exploring the wall, flitting along the ground. To see their hesitation, one would think that they were at a loss to discover the exact place of the bait that attracts [[277]]them. Though they have come from very far without mistake, they seem uncertain of their bearings once they are on the spot. Nevertheless, sooner or later they enter the room and pay their respects to the captive, without much importunity. At two o’clock all is over. Ten Moths have been here.
All through the week, each time at noon-day, when the light is at its brightest, Moths arrive, but in decreasing numbers. The total is nearly forty. I see no reason to repeat experiments which could add nothing to what I already know; and I confine myself to stating two facts. In the first place, the Lesser Peacock is a day insect, that is to say, he celebrates his wedding in the brilliant light of the middle of the day. He needs radiant sunshine. The Great Peacock, on the contrary, whom he so closely resembles in his adult form and in the work which he does as a caterpillar, requires the dusk of the early hours of the night. Let him who can explain this strange contrast of habits.
In the second place, a powerful air-current, sweeping the other way any particles capable of instructing the sense of smell, does not prevent the Moths’ arriving from a direction [[278]]opposite to that of the odoriferous flux, as our physics imagine it.
If I am to go on with my observations, I want a day Moth; not the Lesser Peacock, who made his appearance too late, at a time when I had nothing to ask him, but another, no matter whom, provided that he be quick at discovering nuptial feasts. Shall I find this Moth? [[279]]
[1] Thursday is the weekly holiday in French schools.—Translator’s Note. [↑]