hin my reach. I soon fill my pockets. Moving backwards,
still straddling my branch, I recover terra firma. O wondrous days of
litheness and assurance, when, for a few filberts, on a perilous perch
we braved the abyss!

Enough. These reminiscences, so dear to my dreams, do not interest the
reader. Why stir up more of them? I am content to have brought this fact
into prominence: the first glimmers of light penetrating into the dark
chambers of the mind leave an indelible impression, which the years make
fresher instead of dimmer.

Obscured by everyday worries, the present is much less familiar to us,
in its petty details, than the past, with childhood's glow upon it. I
see plainly in my memory what my prentice eyes saw; and I should never
succeed in reproducing with the same accuracy what I saw last week. I
know my village thoroughly, though I quitted it so long ago; and I know
hardly anything of the towns to which the vicissitudes of life have
brought me. An exquisitely sweet link binds us to our native soil; we
are like the plant that has to be torn away from the spot where it put
out its first roots. Poor though it be, I should love to see my own
village again; I should like to leave my bones there.

Does the insect in its turn receive a lasting impression of its earliest
visions? Has it pleasant memories of its first surroundings? We will
not speak of the majority, a world of wandering gipsies who establish
themselves anywhere provided that certain conditions be fulfilled; but
the others, the settlers, living in groups: do they recall their native
village? Have they, like ourselves, a special affection for the place
which saw their birth?

Yes, indeed they have: they remember, they recognize the maternal abode,
they come back to it, they restore it, they colonize it anew. Among many
other instances, let us quote that of the Zebra Halictus. She will show
us a splendid example of love for one's birthplace translating itself
into deeds.

The Halictus' spring family acquire the adult form in a couple of months
or so; they leave the cells about the end of June. What goes on inside
these neophytes as they cross the threshold of the burrow for the
first time? Something, apparently, that may be compared with our own
impressions of childhood. An exact and indelible image is stamped on
their virgin memories. Despite the years, I still see the stone
whence came the resonant notes of the little Toads, the parapet of
currant