To be present at the construction of the pear is no easy matter: the mystery-loving artist obstinately refuses to do any work as soon as the light reaches her. She needs absolute darkness for her modelling; and I need light if [[78]]I would see her at her task. It is impossible to unite the two conditions. Let us try, nevertheless; let us catch some glimpses of the truth whose fulness eludes our vision.
The arrangements made are as follows: I once more take the big jar. I cover the bottom with a layer of earth two or three inches deep. To obtain the transparent workshop necessary for my observations, I fix a tripod on the earthy layer and, on this support, about four inches in height, I place a round piece of deal of the same diameter as the jar. The glass-walled chamber thus marked out will represent the roomy crypt in which the insect works. A piece is scolloped out of the edge of the deal block, large enough to permit of the passage of the Beetle and her ball. Lastly, above this screen, I heap a layer of earth as deep as the jar allows.
During the operation, a portion of the upper earth falls through the opening and slips down to the lower space in a wide inclined plane. This was a circumstance which I had foreseen and which was indispensable to my plan. By means of this slope, the artist, when she has found the communicating trap-door, will make for the transparent cell which I have arranged for her. She will make for it, of course, only provided that she be in perfect darkness. I therefore make a cardboard cylinder, closed at the top, and place it over the glass jar. Left standing where it is, the opaque sheath will provide the dusk which the insect wants; suddenly raised, it will give the light which I want.
Things being thus arranged, I go in quest of a mother who has just withdrawn into solitude with her ball. A morning’s search is enough to provide me with what I need. I place the mother and her ball on the surface of the upper layer of earth; I cap the apparatus with its [[79]]cardboard sheath; and I wait. I say to myself that the Beetle is too persevering to give up work until her egg is housed and that she will therefore dig herself a new burrow, dragging her ball with her as she goes; she will pass through the upper layer of earth, which is not sufficiently thick; she will come upon the deal board, an obstacle similar to the broken stones that often bar her passage in the course of her normal excavations; she will investigate the cause of the impediment and, finding the opening, will descend through this trap-door to the lower compartment, which, being free and roomy, will represent to the insect the crypt whence I have just removed it. But all this takes time; and I must wait for the morrow to satisfy my impatient curiosity.
The hour has come: let us go and see. The study-door was left open yesterday: the mere sound of the door-handle might disturb and stop my distrustful worker. By way of greater precaution, before entering I put on noiseless slippers. And now, whoosh! The cylinder is removed. Capital! My forecast was correct.
The Beetle occupies the glazed studio. I surprise her at work, with her broad foot laid on the rough model of the pear. But, startled by the sudden light, she remains motionless, as though petrified. This lasts a few seconds. Then she turns her back upon me and awkwardly ascends the inclined plane, to reach the dim heights of her gallery. I give a glance at the work, take note of its shape and its position, and once more restore darkness with the cardboard sheath. Let us not prolong our intrusion, if we would renew the test.
My sudden, short visit gives us some idea of the mysterious work. The ball, which at first was absolutely spherical, is now depressed at the top into a sort of shallow [[80]]crater with a swollen rim. The thing reminds me, on a very much smaller scale, of certain prehistoric pots, with a round belly, a thick-lipped mouth and a narrow groove round the neck. This rough model of the future pear tells us of the insect’s method, a method identical with that of pleistocene man ignorant of the potter’s wheel.
The plastic ball, ringed at one end, has had a groove made in it, the starting-point of the neck of the pear; it has also been drawn out slightly into a rather blunt projection. In the centre of this projection pressure has been applied. The first stage of the work therefore consists merely in placing a ring round the ball and applying pressure.
Towards evening I pay another sudden visit, in complete silence. The insect has recovered from its excitement of the morning and gone down again to its workshop. Troubled by the flood of light, baffled by the strange events to which my artifices give rise, it at once makes off and takes refuge in the upper story. The poor mother, persecuted by these illuminations, moves away into the darkest recesses; but she goes regretfully, with hesitating steps.
The work has progressed. The crater has become deeper; its thick lips have disappeared, are thinner, closer together, drawn out into the neck of a pear. The object, however, has not changed its place. Its position and direction are exactly as I noted them before. The side that rested on the ground is still at the bottom, at the same point; the side that faced upwards is still at the top; the crater that lay on my right has been replaced by the neck, still on my right. All of which gives conclusive proof of my earlier statements: there is no rolling, but only pressure, which kneads and shapes. [[81]]