In the name of the might that is mine, of trickery, of highway robbery, clear out of that, you, and make room for me: give me your seat at the banquet! That is the inexorable law in the world of animals and more or less, alas, in our own world as well! Now, among our entomological auxiliaries, the smallest in size are the best at their work. One of them is charged with watching over the cabbages. She is so small, she works so discreetly that the gardener does not know her, has not even heard of her. Were he to see her by accident, flitting around the plant which she protects, he would take no notice of her, would not suspect the service rendered. I propose to set forth the tiny midget’s deserts. Scientists call her Microgaster glomeratus. What exactly was in the mind of the author of the name Microgaster, which means little belly? Did he intend to allude to the insignificance of the abdomen? Not so. However slight the belly may be, the insect nevertheless possesses one, correctly proportioned to the rest of the body, so that the classic denomination, far from giving us any information, might mislead us, were we to trust it wholly. Nomenclature, which changes from day to day and becomes more and more cacophonous, is an unsafe guide. Instead of asking the animal what its name is, let us begin by asking: “What can you do? What is your business?” Well, the Microgaster’s business is to exploit the Cabbage-caterpillar, a clearly-defined business, admitting of no possible confusion. Would we behold her works? In the spring, let us inspect the neighbourhood of the kitchen-garden. Be our eye never so unobservant, we shall notice against the walls or on the withered grasses at the foot of the hedges some very small yellow cocoons, heaped into masses the size of a hazel-nut. Beside each group lies a Cabbage-caterpillar, sometimes dying, sometimes dead and always presenting a most tattered appearance. These cocoons are the work of the Microgaster’s family, hatched or on the point of hatching into the perfect stage; the caterpillar is the dish whereon that family has fed during its larval state. The epithet glomeratus, which accompanies the name of Microgaster, suggests this conglomeration of cocoons. Let us collect the clusters as they are, without seeking to separate them, an operation which would demand both patience and dexterity, for the cocoons are closely united by the inextricable tangle of their surface-threads. In May, a swarm of pigmies will sally forth, ready to get to business in the cabbages.