The pincers, buccal hands suggesting the claws of the Crayfish, are organs of battle and information. When moving forwards, the animal holds them in front of him, with the fingers opened, to take stock of things encountered on the way. When he wants to stab, the claws catch the adversary and hold him motionless, while the sting operates above the assailant’s back. Lastly, when he has to nibble a morsel for any length of time, they serve as hands and keep the prey within reach of the mouth. They are never used for walking, for support or for the work of excavation. That falls to the real legs. These are abruptly truncated and end in a group of little curved, moveable claws, faced by a short, fine point, which, in a manner of speaking, serves as a thumb. The stump is finished off with rough bristles. The whole constitutes an excellent grapnel, which explains the Scorpion’s capacity for roaming round the trellis-work of my wire bells, for standing there very long in a reversed position and, lastly, for clambering up a vertical wall, notwithstanding his clumsiness and awkwardness. Below, immediately after the legs, are the combs, strange organs, an exclusive attribute of the Scorpions. They owe their name to their structure, consisting of a long row of scales arranged close together in the manner of the teeth of our ordinary combs. The anatomists are inclined to ascribe to these the functions of a gearing-apparatus capable of keeping the couple connected at the moment of pairing. In order to observe their domestic manners, I lodge my captives in a large glass volery, with big potsherds to serve them as a refuge. There are a couple of dozen Scorpions, all told. In April, when the Swallow returns to us and the Cuckoo sounds his first note, a revolution takes place among my hitherto peaceable Scorpions. Several of them, in the colonies which I have established in the open air, in my garden, go wandering about at night and do not return to their homes. A more serious matter: often, under the same piece of crockery, are two Scorpions, of whom one is in the act of devouring the other. Is it a matter of burglary among insects of the same order, who, falling into vagabond ways at the commencement of the fine weather, thoughtlessly enter their neighbours’ houses and there meet with their undoing, unless they be the stronger? One would almost think it, so calmly is the intruder eaten up, for days at a time and by small mouthfuls, even as an ordinary prey would be.