Note 5 — Chapter x · THE SPANISH COPRIS: THE HABITS OF THE MOTHER

From this pole to the other the ovoid measures, on an average, forty millimetres, by thirty-four across.5 Its whole surface is tightly packed, hardened by pressure, converted into a crust with a little earth grained into it. At the projecting end, an attentive eye will discover a ring bristling with short straggling threads. Once the egg is laid in the cup into which the original sphere is hollowed, the mother, as I have already said, gradually brings the edges of the cavity together. This produces the projecting end. To complete the closing, she delicately rakes the ovoid and scrapes a little of the material upwards. This forms the ceiling of the hatching-chamber. At the top of this ceiling, which, if it fell in, would destroy the egg, the pressure is very slight indeed, leaving an area devoid of rind and covered with bits of thread. Immediately under this circle, which is a sort of porous felt, lies the hatching-chamber, the egg’s little cell, which easily admits air and warmth.