Before the week is out, I dig up the soil of the volery and lay bare the burrow, the victualling of which I have partly followed. As in the fields, it is a spacious hall, with an irregular, surbased ceiling and an almost level floor. In a corner is a round hole, similar to the orifice of the neck of a bottle. This is the business-entrance, opening on a slanting gallery that runs up to the surface. The walls of the house dug in fresh soil are carefully piled up and possess enough power of resistance not to give way under the disturbance produced by my excavations. We can see that, in labouring for the future, the insect has put forth all its talent, all its strength as a digger, to produce lasting work. Whereas the marquee in which we feast is a cavity hurriedly hollowed out, our permanent dwelling is a crypt of larger dimensions and of a much more finished construction. I suspect that both sexes take part in the master work: at least, I often come upon the couple in the burrows destined for the laying. The roomy and luxurious apartment was no doubt once the wedding-hall; the marriage was consummated under the great vault to the building of which the swain has contributed: a gallant way of declaring his ardour. I also suspect the husband of lending a hand to his partner with the harvesting and the storing. From what I have gathered, he too, strong as he is, collects his armfuls and goes down into the crypt. The minute and tricky work goes much faster with two helping. But, once the house is well supplied, he retires discreetly, returns to the surface and goes and settles down elsewhere, leaving the mother to her delicate functions. His part in the family-mansion is ended. Now what do we find in this mansion, to which we have seen so many tiny loads of provisions lowered? A muddled heap of separate morsels? Not in the least. I always find a single lump, a huge loaf which fills the box, but for a narrow passage all around, just wide enough to leave the mother room to move. This sumptuous lump, a real Twelfth-Night cake, has no fixed shape. I come across some that are ovoid, suggesting a turkey’s egg in form and size; I find some that are a flattened ellipsoid, similar to the common onion; I discover some that are almost round, reminding one of a Dutch cheese; I see some that are circular and slightly raised on the upper surface, like the loaves of the Provençal rustic or, better still, the fougasso à l’iôu [15] wherewith the Easter festival is celebrated. In every case, the surface is smooth and regularly curved.