The labour is great. But among all the species an admirable justice prevails. Whoso works hard while a child, does little when an adult; and _vice versâ_. The bee, which in the larva state is richly fed by its parents, and always carried about and cradled, is destined hereafter to an exceedingly laborious life. On the contrary, another insect which, as a grub, has toiled, and woven, and spun, will having nothing to do in its later life but whisper love-phrases to the rose. I am speaking of Sir Butterfly. For the great majority, hard work is for infancy, for the larva or the grub; work twofold and excessive. On the one hand, the constant, urgent, and pressing search after the food craved for by an immense internal need; the necessity of recruiting and renewing its energies, of restoring the inherited organs, and developing new ones. The existence of these poor motherless creatures is divided between two severe conditions: toil, and growth through disease. For their moultings, or sloughings, are, in effect, a disease. The painful moment having arrived for the little creature to change its clothing, a clothing which clings to its flesh, it is seized with illness, abandons its leaf, and creeps languidly to some solitary asylum. If you saw it in such a soft, inert, and withered condition, so different from its natural state, you would say it was on the point of death. And many do, indeed, succumb at this laborious crisis. Passive, and suspended to a branch, it waits until nature shall complete its work,--until its epidermis be detached from the second skin beneath, recalling it to all the energies of life. It is then that you see the garb, which was formerly so brilliant, dry up and harden like a thenceforth useless thing, carried hither and thither by the wind. But before it will yield and separate, the invalid, despite of its weakness, must twist in every direction, and writhe, and swell, and contract, and employ all the efforts of a being in its strongest moments. At length it has conquered; the old sheath is rent; and I see the insect free, but bathed in sweat. Do not touch it yet, for the slightest pressure will wound. Of this it is aware, and lies perfectly motionless. It is pale, and almost swooning; it must wait patiently, before beginning to move, till its skin is less sensitive and its limbs are much firmer. Soon, fortunately, it will be invigorated by its food; it feels a terrible hunger, which restores its strength and prepares it for another sloughing. Such is its destiny. It is condemned to deliver itself continually in a series of _accouchements_, until it finally attains its latest transformation.