either, when the mandibles bite, because the victim is insensible. The
grub, undisturbed in any way, is then able, with an unfaltering tooth, to
pursue its scientific method of eating.

These marvellous results interested me too much not to inspire me with
fresh devices when I pursued my investigations. Earlier enquiries had
taught me that the larvae of the Digger-wasps are fairly indifferent to the
nature of the game, though the mother always supplies them with the same
diet. I had succeeded in rearing them on a great variety of prey, without
paying regard to their normal fare. I shall return to this subject later,
when I hope to demonstrate its great philosophical significance. Let us
profit by these data and try to discover what happens when we give the
Scolia food which is not properly its own.

I select from my heap of garden-mould, that inexhaustible mine, two larvae
of the Rhinoceros Beetle, Oryctes nasicornis, about one-third full-grown,
so that their size may not be out of proportion to the Scolia's. It is in
fact almost identical with the size of the Cetonia. I paralyse one of them
by giving an injection of ammonia in the nerve-centres. I make a fine
incision in its belly and I place the Scolia on the opening. The dish
pleases my charge; and it would be strange indeed if this were not so,
considering that another Scolia-grub, the larva of the Garden Scolia, feeds
on the Oryctes. The dish suits it, for before long it has burrowed half-way
into the succulent paunch. This time all goes well. Will the rearing be
successful? Not a bit of it! On the third day, the Oryctes decomposes and
the Scolia dies. Which shall we hold responsible for the failure, myself or
the grub? Myself who, perhaps too unskilfully, administered the injection
of ammonia, or the grub which, a novice at dissecting a prey differing from
its own, did not know how to practise its craft upon a changed victim and
began to bite before the proper time?