The sausage is in an upright position, or nearly so. The hatching-chamber is at the bottom end. As the grub grows, it attacks the provisions overhead, but does not touch the wall around, which is of considerable thickness. It has indeed so huge a dish at its disposal that abstinence becomes no difficult matter. The Sacred Beetle’s grub, which has no occasion to take precautions against the winter, has a very skimpy helping. Its little pear is a niggardly ration and is consumed throughout, all but a slender wall, which the inmate, however, takes care to thicken and strengthen with a good layer of its mortar. The grub of the Geotrupes is very differently situated. It is supplied with a colossal sausage, representing nearly a dozen times as much as the other provisions. However well endowed it be with stomach and appetite, it could not possibly consume the whole lot. Besides, the question of food is not the only one to be considered this time: there is also the serious matter of the hibernation. The parents foresaw the severity of the winter and bequeathed their sons the wherewithal to face it. The giant roly-poly will become a blanket against the cold. The grub, as a matter of fact, gnaws bit by bit the part above and scoops out a corridor just wide enough to pass through. In this way, a very thick wall is left intact, the central part alone being consumed. As the sheath is bored, the sides are at the same time cemented and lined with the evacuations of the intestine. Any excess product accumulates and forms a rampart behind. So long as the weather remains favourable, the grub moves about in its gallery; it takes its stand above or below and attacks the provisions with a tooth that grows daily more languid. Five or six weeks are thus passed in banqueting; then comes the cold weather, bringing the winter torpor with it. The grub now digs itself an oval recess, polished by much wriggling of its body, at the lower end of its case, in the mass of material which digestion has transformed into a fine paste; it protects itself with a curved canopy; and it is ready to enjoy its winter slumbers. It can sleep in peace. If its parents have installed it underground at an inconsiderable depth to which the frost penetrates, at any rate they have increased the supply of victuals to the utmost. The effect of this enormous superfluity is to provide an excellent dwelling for the bad weather. In December the grub is full-grown, or not far short of it. If the temperature only lent a hand, the nymphosis would now be due. But times are hard; and the grub, in its wisdom, decides to defer the delicate work of transformation. Sturdy creature that it is, it will be able to resist the cold much better than the nymph, that frail beginning of a new life. It therefore has patience and tarries in a state of torpor. I take it from its cell to examine it.