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giving way. She then flies off and seizes one of the large green grasshoppers, and lodges it safely at the further end. After laying an egg, she again goes off and catches two others, which she deposits with the former, and then closes up the hole. The larva, when produced, feeds on the bodies of the grasshoppers until it changes into a chrysalis. It remains in a chrysalid state for some time; and when it becomes perfected, it eats its way out and flies off.

The grasshoppers caught for the caterpillars of the Pennsylvanian Sand-wasp are often much larger and more strong than the parent insect, so that considerable care is necessary in attacking them. She is said to seize them suddenly, and to plunge her sting into their body in such a manner as not to kill, but merely to render them inactive; for, as in the last species, it is necessary that they should be kept alive for some time in the nest, or they would otherwise putrify, and become unfit for the purpose they were designed to answer.

OF THE WASP TRIBE*.

The Wasps, like Bees, are in general found in large societies; and they construct curious combs or nests, in which they deposit their eggs. Some, however, are solitary, and form for each young-one a separate nest. Their larvæ are soft, without feet, and are fed with the nectar of flowers or honey, but of a kind very inferior to that collected by the bees. The chrysalis is without motion, and has the rudiments of wings.

A distinguishing character of this tribe is their having smooth bodies, apparently without hairs, and their upper wings, when at rest, folded through their whole length. At the base of each of these there is a scaly

* The mouth is horny, and furnished with a compressive jaw, and four unequal, thread-shaped feelers. The antennæ are filiform, the first joint longer than the rest, and cylindrical. The sting is pungent, and concealed within the abdomen.

process, that performs the office of a spring, in preventing the wings from rising too high; a caution of some importance to these carnivorous insects, which pursue their prey at full stretch of wing.

THE HORNET*.

It is chiefly in the hollow trunks of decayed trees that the Hornets form their nest. They live collected together in communities, which consist of males, females, and neuters or labourers. Their nest is of a dirty yellowish colour, and usually constructed under the shelter of some outhouse, in the hole of an old wall, or more frequently in the hollow trunk of some decayed tree. The hole of entrance to this nest is often not more than an inch in diameter.

In the spring of the year, those of the females which have survived the winter, are reanimated by the warmth of the season, issue from their hiding-places, and search out a convenient place in which they can establish their nest. When this is found, they commence their first operation by forming a column, of the same materials as those which are afterwards employed in the other parts of the fabric, but much more compact and solid. This column the female fixes in the most elevated part of the vault, which is intended to contain the nest. kind of cover is next formed, and then a small comb of hexagonal cells, with their openings downward, for the purpose of containing her eggs and the grubs which issue from them.

A

The eggs are soon hatched, and the mother nourishes her offspring with food which she brings to them from abroad. When the grubs have attained their full size, they each spin a silken bed, in which they undergo

* DESCRIPTION. This is an insect of large size. The thorax is black, the fore-part rufous. The extremity of the abdomen is yellow, with three black points on each segment.

SYNONYMS. Vespa crabro. Linn.-Le Frélon. Cuvier.

their metamorphoses into pupa, and afterwards into perfect or winged insects.

The insects first produced are the neuters. These are the working insects, or labourers. From their first entrance into life they are occupied in the work of constructing cells, and in the duty of nourishing the remaining grubs.

As the females still continue to lay their eggs, the family is consequently augmented; and the nest becoming at length too small, necessity requires it to be enlarged. This operation also falls upon the labourers.

In the month of September and the beginning of October, the brood of males and females quit their pupa state. All that are left, whether males, females, or neuters, are generally put to death before the end of October, particularly if the frosts have at all begun to be felt. The Hornets, in place of continuing to nourish the remaining grubs, are now occupied only in tearing in pieces the cells, and throwing them out of the nest. After this period both the males and the neuters daily perish in great numbers; so that, by the end of winter, the females, which are enabled to pass that season in a torpid state, are the only ones that remain alive.

Thus terminates this society, of which the greatest population does not often exceed the number of a hundred or a hundred and fifty individuals.

The combs are composed of a substance which somewhat resembles coarse paper or old parchment.

These insects are extremely voracious. They seize upon, and devour, with great eagerness, other insects, and frequently even bees. Their size gives them a superiority over almost all the flies which they attack; but as they are somewhat slow and heavy in their flight, these are frequently able, by their greater agility, to

escape.

THE COMMON WASP*.

The nest of the common Wasp is always formed under the surface of the earth, and these insects not unfrequently occupy with it the forsaken dwelling of a mole. The entrance to the nest is a passage usually about an inch in diameter, from half a foot to two feet deep, and generally in a zigzag direction.

When exposed to the view, the whole nest appears to be of a roundish form, and is twelve or fourteen inches in diameter. It is strongly fortified all round with walls, in layers, formed of a substance somewhat like paper, the surface of which is rough and irregular. In these walls, or rather in this external covering, two holes are left for passages to the combs, one of which is uniformly adopted for entrance, and the other as a passage out. The interior of the nest consists of several stories, or floors of combs, which are parallel to each other, and nearly in an horizontal position. Every story is composed of a numerous assemblage of hexagonal cells. These contain neither wax nor honey, but are solely destined for containing the eggs, the worms which are hatched from them, the chrysalids, and the young Wasps until they are able to fly. combs are from eleven to fifteen in number. Reaumur computed the number of cells in the combs of a middle-sized nest to be at least ten thousand; and as every cell serves for three generations, a nest of this description would annually give birth to thirty thousand Wasps.

The

The different stories of combs are always about half an inch distant. By this arrangement, free passages are left to the Wasps from one part of the nest to another. Each of the larger combs is supported by about

See Plate xix. Fig. 7.

SYNONYMS. Vespa vulgaris. Linn.-La Guêpe commune, in France.

[blocks in formation]

fifty pillars, which at the same time that they give solidity to the fabric, greatly ornament the whole nest. The lesser combs are supported by a similar contrivance. The Wasps always begin at the top and work downward.

M. de Reaumur, in order to examine some parts of the internal economy of these insects, contrived to make them lodge and work in glass hives, like the honeybees. Their extreme affection for their offspring aided him greatly in this: for he found that, although their nests were cut in various directions, and even exposed to the light, they never deserted them, nor relaxed in their attentions to them.

Immediately after a Wasp's nest had been transported from its natural situation, and covered with a glass hive, the first operation of the insects was to repair the injuries it had suffered. With wonderful activity they carried off all the earth and foreign bodies that had accidentally been conveyed into the hive. Some of them occupied themselves in fixing the nest to the top and sides of the hive, by pillars of paper, similar to those that support the different stories or strata of combs; others repaired the breaches it had sustained; and others fortified it, by augmenting the thickness of its external cover.

In the formation of their nests, Wasps differ greatly from the bees. Instead of collecting the farina of flowers, and digesting it into wax, they gnaw small fibres of wood from the sashes of windows, the posts and doors of gardens, or old rails, which their strong and serrated jaws enable them to do with great ease. These fibres, though very slender, are often a tenth of an inch in length. After cutting a certain number, they collect them into small bundles, transport them to their nest; and, by means of a glutinous substance furnished from their own bodies, the labouring Wasps, which are employed in the nests, form them into a moist and ductile paste. Of this substance they construct the external cover, the partitions of the nest, the hexagonal

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