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There is another instance mentioned by Amoretti in the preface to his translation of Pigafetta's journal of Magellan's voyage, and that was with Fabre's translation of the copy of the journal given by Pigafetta to the mother of Francis I. Premier voyage autour du monde. xxxii. The general cast of it, however, is simple and not unpleasing.
That he was able, later on, to narrate the wonderful history of the Pelopaeus, whose habits he had observed at Avignon, was due to the fact that this curious insect had come to lodge with him, having chosen Fabre's chamber for its dwelling.
Then he trotted out of the house and away to the Little Chemist, who came passively with him. All that day, and for many days, they fought to save Pomfrette's life. The Cure came also; but Pomfrette was in fever and delirium. Yet the good M. Fabre's presence, as it ever did, gave an air of calm and comfort to the place.
"Mademoiselle Fabre, at M. Urbain Fabre's, Rue Saint-Dominique-D'Enfer, No. 17." Thenardier seized the letter with a sort of feverish convulsion. "Wife!" he cried. The Thenardier woman hastened to him. "Here's the letter. You know what you have to do. There is a carriage at the door. Set out at once, and return ditto." And addressing the man with the meat-axe:
How much more comprehensible and interesting their life would become! But "when the hymenopteron breaks its cocoon, where are its masters! Its predecessors have long ago disappeared. How then can it receive education by example?" Let us return to Fabre's laboratory, to the covers of wire-gauze, and note what becomes, at the approach of winter, of the survivors of the vespine city.
But he served also another and less obvious end; his substance, or at least some portion of his substance, was an almost necessary ingredient in the act of generation, something in the nature of a necessary excitant of the ovaries, "a horrible titbit," which completed and consummated the great task of fecundation. Such, in Fabre's eyes, was the imperious physiological reason of these rude laws.
There was something epic in it. It recalled to the mulatto's mind some of Fabre's lovely descriptions. It reminded him of two or three books on entomology which he had left in his mother's cabin. He felt he ought to go after them while the spiders were migrating. He suddenly made up his mind he would go at once, as soon as he had had dinner; somewhere about one o'clock.
"The wonder would be if you could not." "There was nothing in the least miraculous about this," she declared. "It wasn't done by folding my wings and weaving mystic circles with a wand. Besides making that translation, oh, terribly bad, I'm afraid, into French, I've cajoled and intrigued industriously for weeks like one of those patient wicked little spiders of Henri Fabre's.
Fabre's essay on this insect has not yet been translated into English; but readers interested in the matter will find a full description in "An Introduction to Entomology," by William Kirby, Rector of Barham, and William Spence: letter 21. It is a very crude and revolting art, disgusting to the eye. The Diadem Anthidium belongs to another school.
The annoyance of Saint-Florentin, Minister of State, was so well-known, that Fabre, on his liberation, was induced to conceal himself. Nor could he yet marry his promised wife, as he had not been discharged, but was only on leave of absence; and Saint-Florentin obstinately refused to reverse the sentence that had been pronounced against him. In the meantime, Fabre's name was becoming celebrated.
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