In the second place, the point where the Mouse lay being recognized as presenting an insurmountable resistance, there was no grave dug in advance, a little farther off, in the light soil. All attempts were limited, I repeat, to shallow soundings which informed the insect of the possibility of inhumation.

It is absolute nonsense to speak of their first preparing the grave to which the body will afterwards be carted. To excavate the soil, our grave-diggers must feel the weight of their dead on their backs. They work only when stimulated by the contact of its fur. Never, never in this world do they venture to dig a grave unless the body to be buried already occupies the site of the cavity. This is absolutely confirmed by my two and a half months and more of daily observations.

The rest of Clairville's anecdote bears examination no better. We are told that the Necrophorus in difficulties goes in search of assistance and returns with companions who assist him to bury the Mouse. This, in another form, is the edifying story of the Sacred Beetle whose pellet had rolled into a rut. powerless to withdraw his treasure from the gulf, the wily Dung-beetle called together three or four of his neighbours, who benevolently recovered the pellet, returning to their labours after the work of salvage.

The exploit--so ill-interpreted--of the thieving pill-roller sets me on my guard against that of the undertaker. Shall I be too exigent if I enquire what precautions the observer adopted to recognize the owner of the Mouse on his return, when he reappears, as we are told, with four assistants? What sign denotes that one of the five who was able, in so rational a manner, to appeal for help? Can one even be sure that the one to disappear returns and forms one of the band? There is nothing to indicate it; and this was the essential point which a sterling observer was bound not to neglect. Were they not rather five chance Necrophori who, guided by the smell, without any previous understanding, hastened to the abandoned Mouse to exploit her on their own account? I incline to this opinion, the most likely of all in the absence of exact information.

Probability becomes certainty if we submit the case to the verification of experiment. The test with the brick already gives us some information. For six hours my three specimens exhausted themselves in efforts before they got to the length of removing their booty and placing it on practicable soil. In this long and heavy task helpful neighbours would have been anything but unwelcome. Four other Necrophori, buried here and there under a little sand, comrades and acquaintances, helpers of the day before, were occupying the same cage; and not one of those concerned thought of summoning them to give assistance. Despite their extreme embarrassment, the owners of the Mouse accomplished their task to the end, without the least help, though this could have been so easily requisitioned.

Being three, one might say, they considered themselves sufficiently strong; they needed no one else to lend them a hand. The objection does not hold good. On many occasions and under conditions even more difficult than those presented by a stony soil, I have again and again seen isolated Necrophori exhausting themselves in striving against my artifices; yet not once did they leave their work to recruit helpers. Collaborators, it is true, did often arrive, but they were convoked by their sense of smell, not by the first possessor. They were fortuitous helpers; they were never called in. They were welcomed without disagreement, but also without gratitude. They were not summoned; they were tolerated. In the glazed shelter where I keep the cage I happened to catch one of these chance assistants in the act. Passing that way in the night and scenting dead flesh, he had entered where none of his kind had yet penetrated of his own free will. I surprised him on the wire-gauze dome of the cover. If the wire had not prevented him, he would have set to work incontinently, in company with the rest. Had my captives invited him? Assuredly not. He had hastened thither attracted by the odour of the Mole, heedless of the efforts of others. So it was with those whose obliging assistance is extolled. I repeat, in respect of their imaginary prowess, what I have said elsewhere of that of the Sacred Beetles: the story is a childish one, worthy of ranking with any fairy-tale written for the amusement of the simple.

A hard soil, necessitating the removal of the body, is not the only difficulty familiar to the Necrophori. Often, perhaps more often than not, the ground is covered with grass, above all with couch-grass, whose tenacious rootlets form an inextricable network below the surface. To dig in the interstices is possible, but to drag the dead animal through them is another matter: the meshes of the net are too close to give it passage. Will the grave-digger find himself reduced to impotence by such an impediment, which must be an extremely common one? That could not be.

Exposed to this or that habitual obstacle in the exercise of his calling, the animal is always equipped accordingly; otherwise his profession would be impracticable. No end is attained without the necessary means and aptitudes. Besides that of the excavator, the Necrophorus certainly possesses another art: the art of breaking the cables, the roots, the stolons, the slender rhizomes which check the body's descent into the grave. To the work of the shovel and the pick must be added that of the shears. All this is perfectly logical and may be foreseen with complete lucidity. Nevertheless, let us invoke experiment, the best of witnesses.

I borrow from the kitchen-range an iron trivet whose legs will supply a solid foundation for the engine which I am devising. This is a coarse network of strips of raphia, a fairly accurate imitation of the network of couch-grass roots. The very irregular meshes are nowhere wide enough to admit of the passage of the creature to be buried, which in this case is a Mole. The trivet is planted with its three feet in the soil of the cage; its top is level with the surface of the soil. A little sand conceals the meshes. The Mole is placed in the centre; and my squad of sextons is let loose upon the body.

Without a hitch the burial is accomplished in the course of an afternoon. The hammock of raphia, almost equivalent to the natural network of couch-grass turf, scarcely disturbs the process of inhumation. Matters do not go forward quite so quickly; and that is all. No attempt is made to shift the Mole, who sinks into the ground where he lies. The operation completed, I remove the trivet. The network is broken at the spot where the corpse lay. A few strips have been gnawed through; a small number, only so many as were strictly necessary to permit the passage of the body.

Well done, my undertakers! I expected no less of your savoir-faire. You have foiled the artifices of the experimenter by employing your resources against natural obstacles. With mandibles for shears, you have patiently cut my threads as you would have gnawed the cordage of the grass-roots. This is meritorious, if not deserving of exceptional glorification. The most limited of the insects which work in earth would have done as much if subjected to similar conditions.

Let us ascend a stage in the series of difficulties. The Mole is now fixed with a lashing of raphia fore and aft to a light horizontal cross-bar which rests on two firmly-planted forks. It is like a joint of venison on a spit, though rather oddly fastened. The dead animal touches the ground throughout the length of its body.

The Necrophori disappear under the corpse, and, feeling the contact of its fur, begin to dig. The grave grows deeper and an empty space appears, but the coveted object does not descend, retained as it is by the cross-bar which the two forks keep in place. The digging slackens, the hesitations become prolonged.

However, one of the grave-diggers ascends to the surface, wanders over the Mole, inspects him and ends by perceiving the hinder strap. Tenaciously he gnaws and ravels it. I hear the click of the shears that completes the rupture. Crack! The thing is done. Dragged down by his own weight, the Mole sinks into the grave, but slantwise, with his head still outside, kept in place by the second ligature.

The Beetles proceed to the burial of the hinder part of the Mole; they twitch and jerk it now in this direction, now in that. Nothing comes of it; the thing refuses to give. A fresh sortie is made by one of them to discover what is happening overhead. The second ligature is perceived, is severed in turn, and henceforth the work proceeds as well as could be desired.