On a steep bank of red clay, I at length recognize, in no great profusion, the signs of a village of Odyneri. Here are the characteristic chimneys mentioned by the two historians, that is to say, the curved tubes, with their guilloche-work, that hang at the entrance to the dwelling. The bank is exposed to the heat of the noonday sun. A little tumbledown wall surmounts it; behind is a dense screen of pines. The whole forms a warm refuge, such as the Wasp requires for setting up house. Moreover, we are now in the second fortnight of the month of May, which is just the working-season, according to the masters. The outside architecture, the site and the period all agree with what Réaumur and Léon Dufour have told us. Have I really chanced upon one or other of their Odyneri? This remains to be seen and without delay. Not one of the ingenious constructors of guilloche porticoes shows herself, not one arrives; I must wait. I take up my position close by, to watch the homing insects. Ah, how long the hours seem, spent motionless, under a burning sun, at the foot of a declivity which sends the heat of an oven beating down upon you! Bull, my inseparable companion, has retired some distance into the shade, under a clump of evergreen oaks. He has found a layer of sand whose depths still retain some traces of the last shower. He digs himself a bed; and in the cool furrow the sybarite stretches himself flat upon his belly. Lolling his tongue and thrashing the boughs with his tail, he keeps his soft, deep gaze fixed upon me: “What are you doing over there, you booby, baking in the heat? Come here, under the foliage; see how comfortable I am!” That is what I seem to read in my companion’s eyes. “Oh, my Dog, my friend,” I should answer, if you could only understand, “man is tormented by a desire for knowledge, whereas your torments are confined to a desire for bones and, from time to time, a desire for your sweetheart! This, notwithstanding our devoted friendship, creates a certain difference between us, even though people nowadays say that we are more or less related, almost cousins. I feel the need to know things and am content to bake in the heat; you feel no such need and retire into the cool shade.” Yes, the hours drag when you lie waiting for an insect that does not come. In the pinewood hard by, a couple of Hoopoes are chasing each other with the amorous provocations of spring: “Oopoopoo!” cries the cock, in a muffled tone. “Oopoopoo!”