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It's been a long time since I read Doc Smith's Lensman series. (Too long!) But when I read this question on English Language and Usage asking for a subtle metaphor for stupidity, Zabriskan Fontema instantly popped into my brain.

What did they do, or not do, that made everyone agree they were the stupidest creatures in the universe? All I remember is that they were circular, and rolled along until they hit something and then turned at right angles and continued to roll along in the new direction. Not bright, obviously, but the stupidest of all? What am I forgetting about their behavior?

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The incident that seems to have given the fontema its bad reputation is from First Lensman and is recounted in Chapter 11, Zabriskan Fontema.

You're slightly misremembering that it turned when it hit something. In this chapter Jack Northrop and Virgil Samms learn that when a fontema hits an obstruction, it continues to try and move forward.

...it either did not know or not care that its drivers were slipping on the smooth, hard sand; that it could not climb the vertical metal plate; that it was not getting anywhere.

Also, when a vertical shaft was stuck into the ground ahead of a fontema but to one side of its center-line, the fontema became trapped and circled endlessly (they were solar powered).

Around and around that slim wire the creature went: unable, it seemed, to escape from even such a simple trap; perfectly willing, it seemed, to spend all the rest of its life traversing that tiny circle.

Although an incident of fontema reproduction is described in the chapter (who said Doc Smith was priggish?), these traits would seem to seriously challenge their evolutionary fitness, and presumably Samms and/or Northrop spread the story of their lack of intelligence.

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    Thanks. +1. I have to reread the Lensman series. I am looking forward to getting reacquainted with Worsel. If the ZFs are solar powered, I suppose they taste awful because otherwise they would be easy prey at night. Or maybe they have storage batteries.
    – user48960
    Commented Apr 26, 2017 at 2:49
  • They may have been the only life on the planet. I don't remember that bit. But I think they stopped rolling when one of the protagonists shaded them out.
    – Organic Marble
    Commented Apr 26, 2017 at 2:50
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    No batteries, they can't survive without constant sunlight. IIRC, the planet was tidally locked so one side always faced the sun. No predators or other lifeforms were observed, but the heroes weren't on the planet all that long.
    – Harry Johnston
    Commented Apr 26, 2017 at 12:39

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