This lack of resistance, induced by the torpor of the transformation, appears to me necessary, in view of the weakness of the nursling as it leaves the egg, whenever the mother is herself incapable of depriving the victim of the power of self defense. And so the nonparalyzed larvae are attacked during the period of the nymphosis. We shall soon see other instances of this. Motionless though it be, the Chalicodoma grub is none the less alive. The primrose tint and the glossy skin are unequivocal signs of health: Were it really dead, it would, in less than twenty-four hours, turn a dirty brown and, soon after, decompose into a fluid putrescence. Now here is the marvelous thing: during the fortnight, roughly, that the Anthrax' meal lasts, the butter color of the larva, an unfailing symptom of the presence of life, continues unaltered and does not change into brown, the sign of putrefaction, until hardly anything remains; and even then the brown hue is often absent. As a rule, the look of live flesh is preserved until the final pellet, formed of the skin, the sole residue, makes its appearance. This pellet is white, with not a speck of tainted matter, proving that life persists until the body is reduced to nothing. We here witness the transfusion of one animal into another, the change of Chalicodoma substance into Anthrax substance; and, as long as the transfusion is not complete, as long as the eaten has not disappeared altogether and become the eater, the ruined organism fights against destruction. What manner of life is this, which may be compared with the life of a night light whose extinction is not accomplished until the last drop of oil has burnt away? How is any creature able to fight against the final tragedy of corruption up to the last moment in which a nucleus of matter remains as the seat of vital energy? The forces of the living creature are here dissipated not through any disturbance of the equilibrium of those forces, but for the want of any point of application for them: the larva dies because materially there is no more of it. Can we be in the presence of the diffusive life of the plant, a life which persists in a fragment? By no means: the grub is a more delicate organic structure. There is unity between the several parts; and none of them can be jeopardized without involving the ruin of the others. If I myself give the larva a wound, if I bruise it, the whole body very soon turns brown and begins to rot. It dies and decomposes by the mere prick of a needle; it keeps alive, or at least preserves the freshness of the live tissues, so long as it is not entirely emptied by the Anthrax' sucker. A nothing kills it; an atrocious wasting does not. No, I fail to understand the problem; and I bequeath it to others.