Note 5 — Chapter xiii · THE HARICOT-WEEVIL
Reading edition
The problem of the haricot had reached this stage, almost elucidated by the insect’s evidence alone, when an unexpected document came and gave me the last word of the riddle. It is once more a poet—and a very famous poet—M. José Maria de Heredia,5 who comes to the naturalist’s aid. Without suspecting the service which he is rendering me, the village schoolmaster lends me a magazine6 in which I read the following conversation between the masterly chaser of sonnets and a lady journalist who asks him which of his works he prefers: