: The Life of the Scorpion by Fabre Jean Henri Miall Bernard Translator Teixeira De Mattos Alexander Translator - Scorpions

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same stone. The Scorpion was at home; the other roaming about at night, had taken temporary shelter there. No regrettable incident had ensued from their cohabitation. Is this always so? We shall see.

I confront the two horrors with each other in a large glass jar containing sand. The Centipede goes round and round, hugging the wall of the arena. He is an undulating ribbon, a finger's breadth wide, four or five inches long and ringed with greenish rings on an amber-coloured ground. The long, vibrating antennae sound the space before him; their tips, sensitive as a finger, encounter the motionless Scorpion. The startled animal instantly turns tail. His circuit brings him back to the foe. There is a fresh contact, followed by a fresh flight.

But the Scorpion is now on his guard, with his arched tail advanced and his pincers open. When the Centipede returns to the dangerous point of his circular track, he is seized with the claws, in the neighbourhood of the head. In vain does the long, flexible animal twine and twist; imperturbably, the Scorpion grips it more firmly than ever with his pincers; and no jerks, windings or unwindings succeed in making him let go.

Meanwhile the sting is at work. Three and four times over it is driven into the sides of the Myriapod, who, for his part, opens wide his poison-fangs and strives to bite, without succeeding in doing so, for the front part of his body is held in the stubborn pincers. The hinder part alone struggles and wriggles, coils and uncoils. These efforts are useless. Kept at a distance by the long tongs, the Scolopendra's poisoned fangs are unable to act. I have seen many insect battles; I know none more horrible than that between these two monstrosities. It is enough to make your flesh creep.

A lull enables me to part the combatants and isolate them. The Centipede licks his bleeding wounds and recovers his strength in a few hours. As for the Scorpion, he has suffered no damage. Next day, a fresh assault is delivered. Three times in succession the Myriapod is stabbed, till the blood flows. Then, fearing reprisals, the Scorpion withdraws, as though frightened by his victory. The wounded animal does not strike back and continues its circular flight. This is enough for to-day. I surround the jar with a cardboard cylinder. When darkness is thus produced, they will both keep quiet.

What happens afterwards, especially at night, I do not know. Probably the battle begins all over again and further thrusts of the sting are delivered. At any rate the Centipede is much weaker on the third day. On the fourth, he is dying. The Scorpion watches him without yet daring to devour him. At last, when there is no more movement, the huge quarry is cut up; the head and then the first two segments are eaten. The dish is too copious; the remainder will go bad and be wasted. His exclusive taste for fresh meat will prevent the Scorpion from touching it.

Though stung seven times and oftener, the Centipede does not die until the fourth day; stung once only, the powerful Lycosa perishes that very instant. Death comes almost as quickly to the Praying Mantis, the Sacred Beetle, the Mole-cricket and other hardy specimens which, if impaled by the collector, would kick and struggle for weeks on the cork slab. Any insect stabbed by the sting finds itself forthwith in a parlous plight; the longest-lived are dead within twenty-four hours; and here we have the Centipedes, pinked seven times over, holding out for four days and perhaps dying from loss of blood as much as from the effects of the poison.

Why these points of difference? Apparently they are a matter of organisation. Life is an equilibrium whose stability varies according to the position in the hierarchy. At the top of the ladder, a fall is easy; at the bottom, there is a firm foothold. The finely-organised insect succumbs, whereas the coarser Millipede resists. Is this really the explanation? The Mole-cricket leaves us undecided. He, the boor, perishes just as quickly as do those refined creatures, the Butterfly and the Mantis. No, we do not yet know the secret which the Scorpion conceals in the phial at the end of his tail.

THE LANGUEDOCIAN SCORPION: THE IMMUNITY OF LARVAE

So little do we possess the Scorpion's secret that unexpected facts crop up that strangely complicate the problem. The study of life brings us these surprises. Repeated experiments, with mutually consistent results, seem to justify our formulation of a rule when, suddenly, important exceptions arise, compelling us to follow a fresh path, directly opposed to the first, and leading us to doubt which is the last stage on the road to knowledge. After labouring long and patiently, like an ox yoked to the plow, we have to plant a note of interrogation at the end of the field which we thought that we had made ready for sowing, without any hope of a final answer. One question leads to another.

To-day the Cetonia-larvae have forced upon me a similar change of opinion. It was at the end of November, late in the year, when the adult insect was becoming scarce. At this season of dearth, for lack of anything better wherewith to continue my experiments, I thought of resorting to the grubs of the Cetonia, grubs which abound all the year through in a heap of dead leaves in a corner of the enclosure. The naturalist who questions animals is necessarily a torturer: there is no other means of making them speak. A host of questions therefore sends my curiosity rummaging, as a regular thing, in that heap of leaf-mould. Every physiological laboratory has its appointed victims: the Frog, the Guinea-pig, even the Dog. The Cetonia-larva suffices for my rustic work-shop. I add the humble grub to the noble series of victims of whose suffering our knowledge is born.

The advanced and already cold season has not slackened the Scorpion's activity; the fat grub, on its part, in the warm moisture of the decayed leaves, has retained all the suppleness of its back. Both are in perfect condition. I bring them face to face.

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