Other Inquiries concerning the Sea

"To say nothing of the meteorological apparatus of unparalleled delicacy which they carry on their backs, these caterpillars, as everybody knows, have this remarkable quality, that they travel only in a troop, one after the other, like Breughel's blind men or those of the parable, each of them obstinately, indissolubly following its leader; so much so that, our author having one morning disposed the file on the edge of a large stone vase, thus closing the circuit, for seven whole days, during an atrocious week, amidst cold, hunger and unspeakable weariness, the unhappy troop on its tragic round, without rest, respite or mercy, pursued the pitiless circle until death overtook it." (From Maurice Maeterlinck's preface to The Life of the Spider, on a species of caterpillar.)