THE TRUFFLE-HUNTING BEETLE

BEFORE we come to the Beetle, I must first tell you about my friend, the Dog, who hunts truffles, which are underground mushrooms. Dogs are quite often used for this purpose, and I have had the good fortune on several occasions to go with a Dog who was a great expert in this line. He was certainly nothing to look at, this artist whom I was so anxious to see at work: just a Dog, placid and deliberate in his ways, ugly, unkempt; the sort of Dog you would never have at your own fireside. Talent and poverty often go hand in hand.

His master, a celebrated truffle-gatherer in the village, was at first afraid that I wanted to steal his secrets and set up a rival business, but when he found that I only made drawings of mushrooms and set down lists of underground vegetable things, he let me join his expeditions.

It was agreed between us that the Dog should act as he pleased and receive a bit of bread as his reward after each discovery, no matter whether the underground mushroom he discovered was a real truffle, the kind people like to eat, or an uneatable one. In no case was the master to drive the dog away from a spot where experience told him there was nothing salable to be found. As far as my studies went, I did not care whether the mushrooms were edible or not.

Conducted in this way, the expedition was very successful. The busy Dog trotted along with his nose to the wind, at a moderate pace. Every little while he stopped, questioned the ground with his nostrils, scratched for a few seconds, without too much excitement, then looked up at his master as if to say:

“Here we are, here we are! On my word of honor as a Dog, there’s a truffle here.”

And he spoke the truth. The master dug at the spot indicated. If the trowel went astray, the Dog showed the man how to put it right by sniffing at the bottom of the hole. The mushroom was always there. A Dog’s nose cannot lie. But he made us gather all sorts of underground mushrooms: the large and the small, the fresh and the decayed, the scented and the unscented, the fragrant and those which were the reverse. I was surprised at my collection, which included most of the underground fungi of the neighborhood.

Is it smell as we understand it that guides the Dog in his search? I do not believe that it is, otherwise he would not point out so many varieties which smell so very different. He must perceive something that we cannot. It is a mistake to compare everything by human standards. There are more sensations in the world than we know of. Such secrets are known to insects better than to other animals, like the Dog or the Pig, who also hunts truffles with its nose. We will hear now about the Truffle-hunting Beetle.

This is a pretty little black Beetle, with a pale and velvety belly, round as a cherry-stone and much the same size. By rubbing the tip of its abdomen against the edge of its wing-cases it makes a soft chirrup like that which little birds make when their mother comes with their food. The male wears a graceful horn on his head.

I found these Beetles in a certain pine-woods where there are plenty of mushrooms. It is a pleasant place, where my whole family like to go in the mild days of autumn. They find everything there: old Magpies’ nests, made of bundles of twigs; Jays squabbling with each other, after filling their crops with acorns on the oaks hard by; Rabbits suddenly starting out of a rosemary bush, showing their little white upturned tails. There is lovely sand for the children to dig tunnels in, sand that is easy to build into rows of huts which we thatch with moss and top with a bit of reed by way of a chimney. And when we are there we lunch off an apple to the sound of the Æolian harps of the breezes softly sighing through the pine-needles!

Yes, for the children it is a real paradise. The grown-ups also enjoy it, and one of my chief enjoyments is watching my Truffle-beetle. His burrows may be seen here and there. The door is left open and surrounded merely by a padding of sand. The burrow is about nine inches deep, going straight down in very loose soil. When I cut into it with a knife, I often find that it is empty. The insect has left during the night, having finished its business there and gone to settle elsewhere. The Truffle-beetle is a tramp, a night-walker, who leaves his home whenever he feels like it and easily gets a new one. Sometimes I do find the insect at the bottom of the pit, always alone, sometimes a male, sometimes a female, never two at the same time. The burrow is not a house for the family; it is a sort of bachelor house, dug for comfort only for the solitary Beetle.

The Beetle in this house is clutching a small mushroom, usually partly eaten. He will not part from it. It is his treasure, his worldly goods. Scattered crumbs tell us that we have caught him feasting.

When we take his prize away from him we find that it is a sort of little underground mushroom, closely related to the truffle.

This throws a light upon the habits of the Beetle and his reason for making new burrows so often. In the calm of the twilight, the little gadabout takes to the fields, chirruping softly as he goes, cheering himself with song. He explores the soil, questions it as to its contents, just as the Dog does when hunting for truffles. His sense of smell tells him when the coveted morsel is underneath, covered by a few inches of sand. Certain of the exact spot where the thing lies, he digs straight down and never fails to reach it. As long as the provisions last, he does not go out again. Blissfully he feeds at the bottom of the well he has dug to reach the mushroom. He does not care whether his door is open or not.

When he has eaten all his food, he moves, looking for more, and to find it he digs a new burrow, which will be given up in its turn. Thus he spends all autumn and the next spring, the seasons for mushrooms, traveling from one of his little hotels to another.

This truffle which the Beetle hunts appears to have no particular odor. How, then, can he detect it from the ground over the place where it is buried? He is a clever Beetle, and we do not know yet just how he manages it.