To-day we are giving the blackboard a rest; it is a holiday. We get up early, in view of the contemplated expedition, so early indeed that you will have to start without your breakfast. Have no fear: when your appetite comes, we will call a halt in the shade and you shall find in my bag the usual viaticum, an apple and a piece of bread. The month of May is near at hand; the Sisyphus must have appeared. What we have to do now is to explore, at the foot of the mountain, the lean meadows where the flocks have been; we shall have to break with our fingers, one by one, the cakes dropped by the Sheep and baked by the sun, but still retaining a kernel of crumb under their crust. There we shall find the Sisyphus huddled, waiting for the fresher windfall with which the evening grazers will supply him. Instructed in this secret, which I learnt long ago from chance discoveries, little Paul forthwith becomes a master in the art of shelling Sheep-droppings. He displays such zeal and such an instinct for the best morsels that, after a very few halts, I am rich beyond my fondest hopes. Behold me the proud owner of six couples of Sisyphi, an unprecedented treasure, which I was far from expecting. It will not be necessary to rear these in the vivarium. A wire-gauze cover is enough, with a bed of sand and a supply of victuals to their liking. They are so small, hardly the size of a cherry-stone! And so curious in shape withal! Dumpy body: the hinder end pointed; and very long legs, resembling a Spider’s when outspread: the hind-legs are of inordinate length and curved, which is most useful for clasping and squeezing the pellet. Pairing takes place about the beginning of May, on the surface of the ground, amid the remains of the cake on which the couple have been feasting. Soon the time comes for establishing the family. With equal zeal, husband and wife alike take part in kneading, carting and stowing away the bread for the children. With the cleaver of the fore-legs a morsel of the right size is cut from the lump placed at their disposal. Father and mother manipulate the piece together, giving it little pats, pressing it and fashioning it into a ball as large as a big pea. As in the Sacred Beetle’s workshop, the mathematically round shape is obtained without the mechanical trick of rolling the ball. The fragment is modelled into a sphere before it is moved, before it is even loosened from its support. Here again we have an expert in geometry familiar with the form that is best adapted to make preserved foodstuffs keep for a long time.