[2] Cf. More Beetles: chap. i.—Translator’s Note. [↑]
[3] Cf. The Life of the Grasshopper: chap. xiii.—Translator’s Note. [↑]
[4] Golden Apple-beetles, or Leaf-beetles. Cf. The Mason-Wasps, by J. Henri Fabre, translated by Alexander Teixeira de Mattos: chap. viii.—Translator’s Note. [↑]
[5] Bacon-beetles. Cf. More Beetles: chap. ii.—Translator’s Note. [↑]
[6] 1⁄25 inch.—Translators Note. [↑]
[7] Carolus Linnæus (Karl von Linné: 1707–1778), the Swedish botanist and naturalist, author of Systema naturæ, etc.—Translator’s Note. [↑]
CHAPTER III
THE TEREBINTH-LOUSE: THE GALLS
For curious methods of generation, the Plant-lice bear the palm. Nowhere shall we find anything to beat them unless we pry into the secrets of the sea. We must not look to them for remarkable feats of instinct. The humble, round-bellied Lice are incapable of such achievements; to these stay-at-homes the lifting of a foot spells an excess of emancipation. But they will tell us by what attempts, bewildering in their energy and variety, the universal law that governs the transmission of life has come into being.