I now intervene and turn the pot upside down. Everything is topsy-turvy; the entrance-gallery and the terminal hall disappear. I extract the mother and the pellet from the ruins. Once more the pot is filled with earth; and the same test begins all over again. A few hours are enough to restore the courage shaken by all this upheaval. For the second time, the mother buries herself with the heap of provisions destined for the grub. For the second time also, when the establishment is finished, the overturning of the pot unsettles everything. The experiment is renewed. Persisting in its maternal solicitude, if necessary until its strength gives way, the insect again buries itself, together with its sphere. Four times over, in two days, I have thus seen the mother Beetle bear up under the devastation which I have wrought and start afresh, with touching patience, on the ruined dwelling. I did not think fit to pursue the test. You feel some scruples in submitting maternal affection to such tribulations as these. However, it seems probable that, sooner or later, the exhausted and bewildered insect would have refused to go on digging. My experiments of this kind are numerous; and they all prove that, when taken from her burrow with her work unfinished, the mother shows indefatigable perseverance in burying and depositing in a place of safety the cradle which has begun to take shape though as yet untenanted. For the sake of a pellet of stuff which the presence of the egg has not yet turned into a sacred thing, she displays exaggerated prudence and caution, as well as amazing foresight. No tricks of the experimenter, no all-upsetting accidents, nothing, unless her strength be worn out, can divert her from her object. She is filled with a sort of indomitable obsession. The future of her race requires that the lump of stuff should descend into the earth; and descend it will, whatever happens. Now for the other side of the medal. The egg is laid; everything is in order underground. The mother comes out. I take hold of her as she does so; I dig up the pear or ovoid; I place the work and the worker side by side on the surface of the soil, in the conditions that prevailed just now. This assuredly is the right moment for burying the pill. It contains the egg, a delicate thing which a touch of the sun will wither in its thin wrapper. Expose it for fifteen minutes to the heat of the sun’s rays; and all will be lost. What will the mother do in this grave emergency?