[16] Or Gold Beetle. Cf. More Beetles, by J. Henri Fabre, translated by Alexander Teixeira de Mattos: chaps. xiii and xi.—Translator’s Note. [↑]
[17] Or Rose-chafer. Cf. idem: chap. i.—Translator’s Note. [↑]
[18] Cf. idem: chap. ix.—Translator’s Note. [↑]
[19] Cf. The Sacred Beetle and Others: chaps. xii to xiv.—Translator’s Note. [↑]
[20] Cf. More Beetles: chap. i.—Translator’s Note. [↑]
[21] Cf. idem: chaps. xiii and xiv.—Translator’s Note. [↑]
CHAPTER IV
THE LANGUEDOCIAN SCORPION: THE IMMUNITY OF LARVÆ
So little do we possess the Scorpion’s secret that unexpected facts crop up that strangely complicate the problem. The study of life brings us these surprises. Repeated experiments, with mutually consistent results, seem to justify our formulation of a rule when, suddenly, important exceptions arise, compelling us to follow a fresh path, directly opposed to the first, and leading us to doubt which is the last stage on the road to knowledge. After labouring long and patiently, like an ox yoked to the plow, we have to plant a note of interrogation at the end of the field which we thought that we had made ready for sowing, without any hope of a final answer. One question leads to another.