I take the opportunity, with not much success, to enquire what goes on under the tiles where the strolling couples take refuge; my wish is to see the details of the tender interview from start to finish. It does me no good to turn over the potsherd, even during the quiet hours of the night. I have tried often and in vain. When deprived of their roof, the linked couples resume their ramble and make for another shelter, where the impossibility of prolonged observation [[146]]obtains once more. Special circumstances, independent of any intervention on our part, are needed to make the delicate undertaking succeed.
To-day these circumstances are present. At seven o’clock in the morning, on the 3rd of July, a couple attracts my attention, a couple whom I saw forming, walking about and selecting a home on the previous evening. The male is under the tile, quite invisible save for the tips of his claws. The cabin was too small to shelter the two. He went in; she, with her mighty paunch, remained outside, clutched by the fingers by her companion.
The tail, curved into a wide arc, is bent slackly to one side, with the point of the sting resting on the ground. The eight legs, firmly planted, are drawn backwards, marking a tendency to escape. The whole body is completely motionless. I inspect the fat Scorpioness twenty times in the course of the day, without perceiving the least movement of the hinder part, the least change in the attitude, the least flexion in the curve of the tail. The animal could be no more lifeless if turned to stone. [[147]]
The male, on his side, is no more active. Though I cannot see him, I at least observe his fingers, which would tell me of any change of posture. And this petrified condition, which has lasted for the best part of the night, persists all day, until eight o’clock in the evening. What do they feel, facing each other thus? What are they doing, motionless with clasped fingers? If the expression were allowable, I should say that they are meditating profoundly. It is the only term that more or less represents what I see. But no human language could have words fit to convey the bliss, the ecstasy of the Scorpions thus coupled by the finger-tips. Let us remain silent upon that which we cannot possibly understand.
A little before eight o’clock, when the animation outside the house is already approaching its height, the female suddenly moves; she struggles and, with an effort, contrives to release herself. She flees, with one of the pincers bent back towards her and the other stretched out. To break her seductive bonds, she pulled with such violence that she put one of her shoulders out of joint. She flees, feeling her way with the [[148]]uninjured claw. The male runs off too. All is over for this evening.
These rambles in pairs, which are customary in the evening all through the summer, are evidently the preliminaries to more serious affairs. The strollers inspect each other, display their graces, show off their qualities before coming to conclusions. But when does the decisive moment arrive? My patience is exhausted in waiting for it; I vainly prolong my vigils and turn over potsherd after potsherd, in my anxiety at last to know the exact part played by the combs; my hopes remain unfulfilled.
It is at a very late hour in the night that the marriage is consummated: of that I have no doubt whatever. If I had any chance of arriving at the right moment, I would struggle against sleep till break of day: my old eyelids are still capable of doing so when the acquisition of an idea is at stake. But how hazardous my perseverance would be!
I am very well aware, having seen it over and over again, that, in the vast majority of cases, we find the couple next morning, under the tile, harnessed together just as [[149]]they were on the evening before. To succeed, I should have to upset the habits of a lifetime and lie in wait every night for three or four months on end. The plan is beyond my strength: and I give it up.
Once only did I obtain an inkling of the solution of the problem. At the moment when I lift the stone, the male is turning over without releasing the clasp of his hands; with his belly upturned, he slowly slides backwards under his mate.[2] Even so does the Cricket behave when his pleadings at last obtain a hearing. In this posture, the couple would only have to steady themselves, probably with the teeth of their combs, to achieve their ends. But, startled by the violation of their home, the superimposed twain separate then and there. From the little that I have seen, it seems likely, therefore, that the Scorpions end their mating in an attitude similar to that of the Crickets. In addition they have their hands clasped and their combs interlocked.
I am better informed of subsequent events within the cell. Let us mark the tiles under [[150]]which the couples take refuge in the evening, after their stroll. What do we find next morning? As a rule, precisely the same linked couple as the day before, face to face, with fingers united.