THE BURROWERS

DUFOUR, in describing the fearful ravages of Cerceris ornata among the bees, says that the wasps of this genus are among other insects what eagles and hawks are among birds. While this characterization does not seem to fit the American species, it is certainly true that the genus stands out as one of those in which the distinctive peculiarities are strongly marked. They might be considered the aristocrats in the world of wasps, their habits of reposeful meditation and their calm, unhurried ways being far removed from the nervous manners of the PompilidÆ or the noisy, tumultuous life of Bembex. Their intelligence is shown by their reluctance to betray their nests, and by their uneasiness at any slight change in the objects that surround them. It is not necessary to attempt to catch them or to make threatening gestures, in order to arouse their sense of danger. If you are sitting quietly by a nest when the wasp opens her door in the morning she will notice you at once, and will probably drop out of sight as though she resented your intrusion into her privacy. After a little she will come up again and will learn to tolerate you, but at the least movement on your part, almost at the winking of an eyelid, she will disappear.ill142

Our four representatives of this genus all prey upon beetles that are injurious to vegetation, and therefore deserve the gratitude of agriculturists. Nigrescens, with her pale grayish bands, is a very trying wasp to deal with. We had seen her flying about in the garden for weeks before we succeeded in tracking her home, and when we did succeed she was so late about getting up in the morning, stayed away from home so many hours at a time, and went to bed so early in the afternoon, that we were not well repaid for watching her nest all day. Fumipennis, large and handsome, with a broad yellow band at the front of the abdomen, is another wasp that has no regard for the convenience of the people who are watching her. You may sit by her big open hole for hours without seeing her, and when she comes she drops in so suddenly that, unless you are very much on your guard, you are not sure even then what she is. Clypeata and deserta are better subjects for study.

The nests of our species are all deep, tortuous, and very difficult to excavate. We have never succeeded in finding their pockets; and yet, for various reasons, we feel perfectly certain that all of them are like C. ornata in provisioning, successively, a number of cells which lead out of the main gallery. When one of these cells is filled with food, and the egg deposited, it is probably closed up, and thus separated from the runway. From our experience late in the season with the nests of another wasp, we are inclined to think that we made a mistake in looking for pockets at the lower end of the tunnel. Had we searched higher up, at the point of the curve, we might have found them, the lower part of the gallery probably being designed merely for a dwelling-place for the mother of the family.ill143

But although we did not get distinct pockets, there was, in at least one nest, a supply of food that would have far exceeded the wants of a single larva. We did not succeed in finding eggs on different groups of beetles; but from a nest into which the wasp was still carrying food we took a half-grown larva which was identified as being hers. The fact, too, that a wasp occupies a nest for so long a time as ten days or two weeks points to the conclusion that she uses it for a number of eggs which are laid at intervals.

Cerceris digs her nest, deep as it is, all at once. In this she is a contrast to her near relatives of the genus Philanthus, who busy themselves for an hour or so every morning with fresh excavations.

On the eighth of July the weather was so warm and bright that we went down to the garden at half past eight o’clock, knowing that it was rather early, but hoping that the hot sunshine would tempt the wasps to industry. We had walked up and down several times, when suddenly, right in the pathway, a nest appeared. A great quantity of loose earth had been taken out and heaped up, probably on the preceding day, and in the midst of this a little hole had been opened since we passed before. The place looked so promising that we sat down to watch it, and a few minutes later we were rewarded by a glimpse of some antennÆ down the gallery, and then a little face with yellow markings appeared but quickly vanished. Now followed a very coquettish performance. The wasp came slowly creeping up again and again, only to drop out of sight as soon as she had reached the opening. After a time she grew bolder, and sat in her doorway, twitching her head this way and that in a very expressive manner, as though she were planning the work of the day; but it was plain that although she was up early, business cares were not weighing heavily upon her mind, for forty minutes passed before she came out of the nest, and after making three or four circles about the spot, flew away.

How much livelier and more interesting it would have been if we could have followed her! We tried to guess at what she was doing, and imagined her hunting industriously. After fifteen or twenty minutes it seemed to us that she must have caught something, and that she was surely returning. Most probably she was not working at all, but was breakfasting leisurely and exchanging compliments with her neighbors; for when she did come home after keeping us waiting for an hour and a half, she brought nothing with her, and seemed quite unconscious of the fact that greater things had been expected of her.

We had placed a stone upon a dead leaf near by, to mark the neighborhood of the nest, thinking that even a Cerceris could not object to so simple an arrangement of natural objects; but our wasp noticed it at once, and evidently with much suspicion and disapproval. She began by circling several times just above it. Then she alighted on it and examined it carefully, walking over it, and creeping underneath, perhaps to see whether it in any way menaced the safety of her nest, perhaps as the completion of a locality study made the day before. She then rose on her wings, and after a little more circling, dropped suddenly into her hole.

So far we had not been getting on very rapidly, but from this time things took a turn. Cerceris is never in a hurry, and yet she may be relied upon to do a certain amount of work every day. The one that we were now watching had probably come back for a final look at her newly made nest before beginning to provision it; for she soon reappeared, and this time really went to work, since in forty minutes she brought home a beetle which she carried by the snout, venter up, in her mandibles, supporting it with the second pair of legs while flying. She was much annoyed at our presence, and circled about as before. Twice she alighted near by, and walked around for a few minutes, and when she did this all her feet came down to the ground, the beetle being allowed to hang loosely. At last she made the best of a bad matter, and went in. The rest of the morning was occupied with hunting, the capture of each beetle taking about forty-five minutes. Every time that she came home she spent fifteen or twenty minutes in the nest.

This species soon became very common, and for two weeks scarcely a morning passed without our finding at least one newly-made nest. The study of clypeata, however, consumes a great deal of time. For example, we found, one morning, two nests within six inches of each other. It turned out afterward that these were inhabited by two different wasps; but at the moment we supposed that one of them had been dug and deserted and then a second one made, and wishing to know which one was occupied we resolved to watch and see. After waiting for three hours we saw one wasp returning; but upon noticing us she veered off and began to circle about. She was heavily laden, and her burden, instead of being supported by the second pair of legs, as is sometimes the case, hung down under the thorax and abdomen. After a moment she alighted on a plant near by, and seemed to consider the situation, then circled a little more, and flew away, remaining out of sight for fifteen minutes, then another return, more circlings and hesitations. She seemed to feel the weight of the beetle now, and alighted frequently on the ground and walked about; yet she would not go in, so reluctant was she to betray her nest. In this way she kept us waiting for a whole hour, although we were not very near to her, and were as still as statues. At last we retreated, and stood as far back as we could and still keep the hole in view. She now came closer, and, after hanging poised on her wings for a moment, dropped into her nest.

We once found a nest of this species in process of construction. A large heap of fresh earth had been pushed out, which entirely covered the spot; but at intervals there were upheavals from below which betrayed the presence of the wasp. When we saw it first it was half past eight o’clock, and we judged, from what had been accomplished, that she must have been at work at least an hour. It was half past nine before the excavation was complete. We had not been certain, up to this time, as to what we were watching; but now we had the pleasure of seeing her open her doorway from below and stand in the entrance while she washed her face with her fore feet, like a cat. When they rest at the mouth of the hole the first legs, which are yellow, are bowed in a semicircle on each side of the yellow face, the distal joints being bent up so that the wasps seem to be standing on their elbows. This attitude, which is often seen in Bembex spinolÆ, gives them a delightfully amusing, bow-legged appearance. They usually open their nests in the morning at about nine o’clock,—a little earlier or later according to the time at which the sun strikes the spot. Then they spend from forty minutes to an hour in taking a survey, the least movement on the part of a watcher causing them to drop out of sight as if the earth had given way beneath them. Sometimes there is a little way-station an inch or two within the tunnel, and the wasp falls back only to this point, and here she may be seen, if one peeps in cautiously, either quietly awaiting the retreat of the intruder, or, perhaps, performing her toilet in a leisurely and elegant manner.

Whenever she leaves her nest she makes three or four rapid circles around the spot to freshen her memory of the locality. The most thorough study that we saw made by clypeata was in the case of the wasp mentioned before, that was so long in carrying her beetle in because of our being on the ground. When she finally did go in she stayed only an instant—just long enough to deposit her load—and then came out and spent a long time in an investigation of all the surrounding objects, flying in and out among the plants, now high, now low, and circling again and again around the spot. It looked as though she had been puzzled and disturbed by the presence of unaccustomed things. As soon as the survey was over she went inside and closed the door, as though its object had been not so much to strengthen her memory as to correct former impressions.

The work of bringing in beetles goes on very irregularly, and as a rule not more than two or three are stored in the course of a day. It is not unusual for clypeata to spend three or four hours away from home and then come back without anything; and often, even in the middle of the day, she passes an hour or two in the seclusion of her nest. We had several nests under observation for a week at a time without ever once seeing the owners, although they were evidently occupied, since they were sometimes open and sometimes closed. The outer entrance is always left open when the wasp goes away, although possibly access to the pockets may be barred below; but when she enters she closes the door unless she means to come out again at once. The closing is sometimes effected by pushing the earth up backwards, with the end of the abdomen; but the hole is rather too large for this method, and more frequently the wasp comes up head first, carrying a load of earth in her front legs. This is placed just within and to one side of the entrance, and then more armfuls are brought up, until, after two or three trips, the opening is entirely filled.

We once captured the wasp in a bottle, as she returned, loaded, to the nest. She dropped the beetle, but soon picked it up again and stung it vigorously, with intention, as the French say, first under the neck, and then further back, behind the first pair of legs. After this it was dropped while the wasp fluttered about for a few minutes, but it was then picked up again, and stung as before. We both saw this operation repeated in exactly the same way, four different times, with intervals of five or six minutes between.

In a nest which we excavated after watching it for nine days, we found nothing until we had gone six inches down, and at this point the tunnel was lost; but mixed with the crumbly earth that we took out of the hole, we found eight beetles and a half-grown larva of clypeata. The destruction of this nest was accomplished one morning, and when we came back to the spot twenty-four hours later we found that a new one had been made close by, doubtless by the same individual. We had expected to find her bringing beetles and dropping them foolishly on the ground like Paul Marchal’s Cerceris ornata, and were gratified that she showed an advance in intelligence over that species, although to be sure she would have been still wiser had she chosen an entirely new neighborhood. Another individual was so much disturbed by our scrutiny that she dropped her beetle at the entrance to her nest. She did not pick it up again and utilize it, although it lay for three days in the dust at the threshold.

As to the condition of the beetles stored by clypeata: in the first nest that we opened we found eight, seven of which were dead, while the eighth, which we had just seen stung several times, was alive, but died on the following day. The second nest gave us five beetles, all of them dead and dry. In the other nests that we opened we found nothing, though we knew that the beetles were there had we only been skillful enough to discover them.

Of Cerceris deserta, which closely resembles clypeata, but appears later in the season, we had only a single example. We chanced to see her dropping into a crevice among some lumps of earth, and at first could scarcely believe that this was the dwelling-place of a wasp, as there was nothing whatever about it to indicate a nest; and even after we had removed the rough pieces of earth above, we could see nothing of the loose material that must have been carried out.

She was much like clypeata in her manners, with the same habit of surveying the world from her doorway, and manifesting the same annoyance at our presence when she was returning to the nest; but she carried in more beetles in the course of the day and worked much more rapidly. Between nine and eleven o’clock one morning she brought in five loads, and some of the journeys occupied only ten minutes.

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The first time that she found us sitting by her nest she circled about for nearly an hour, seeming unable to make up her mind to enter. At length we withdrew a little way, but still her suspicions were not entirely allayed; and after a further study of the situation she dropped, not into her own nest, but into a large cricket hole near by. Taken aback by this manoeuvre, and thinking that perhaps we had a second individual to deal with, we stealthily approached, and peering in, could see the cricket inside, the wasp having slipped beyond. It did not seem possible that the little creature could be endeavoring to deceive us, and yet what other explanation could be offered for her conduct? We again took up our distant position, and after ten minutes more had the satisfaction of seeing the wasp slip out of the false nest and drop instantly into the true one. After a little she became quite accustomed to us, and entered her nest without the least delay.

The prey of deserta is held in the mandibles, and while we were watching her she did not support it with the second legs, even when flying.

Philanthus punctatus is a pretty little yellow-banded species much resembling Cerceris in appearance. The nest consists of a main gallery with pockets leading from it, each pocket being stored with one egg and enough bees to nourish a single larva. When the wasps emerge from the cocoon they find themselves in the company of their nearest relatives and in possession of a dwelling-place, and they all live together for a time before starting out independently to seek their fortunes. On the fifth of August we discovered on the island a happy family of this kind, consisting of three brothers and four sisters, the females, with their bright yellow faces and mandibles, being handsomer than the males. They seemed to be on the most amicable terms with each other, their only trouble being that while they were all fond of looking out, the doorway was too small to hold more than one at a time. The nest was opened in the morning at about nine o’clock, and during the next thirty or forty minutes their comical little faces would appear, one after another, each wasp enjoying the view for a few minutes with many twitchings of the head, and then retreating to make way for another, perhaps in response to some hint from behind. Then one by one they would come out, circle about the spot, and depart, sometimes leaving one of their number to keep house all day alone. They usually left the hole open; but when there was a wasp within, it was soon closed from below. During this playtime period they did not return until they were ready to settle down for the night, the first one coming home at half after two or three o’clock, and the others arriving at intervals, none of them staying out later than five. Most commonly they found the right spot without trouble, scratched open the hole, and then either closed it behind them or stood waiting in the doorway for the next arrival; but occasionally they had difficulty in locating the nest, and worked at two or three different places before finding it.

We kept these wasps under close observation, often watching the nest from the moment it was opened in the morning until it was closed at night. On the twelfth of August, a week from the time that we first saw them, one of the females felt the responsibilities of life settling down upon her. At half after four in the afternoon she began to enlarge the nest, and worked with a great deal of energy for forty minutes. After a long disappearance within the hole she would come up backwards, kicking behind her a quantity of earth which was not only taken outside, but was then spread out far and wide. She worked with the front pair of legs, which were curved inward, after the manner of Bembex; and when a pebble or some such object came in her way she either dragged it to a distance with her mandibles or pushed it before her with her head in a way quite peculiar to herself. In distributing the earth that was taken out, she went five and one half inches from the nest—a distance which is much greater than is common among wasps, but which accords well with the habits of punctatus, since she continues the work of excavation from day to day.ill157

On August thirteenth, at half after eight in the morning, we found that a second female, perhaps inspired by the example of her sister, had made a new nest within two inches of the first one, and had flown away, leaving it open. Presently the other wasps began to appear, one after the other, in their doorway. Two of the males flew away, and one of the females, doubtless the one that we had seen digging the night before, began to work afresh at making the nest larger. Probably she was excavating a pocket for the reception of an egg, and the amount of labor required was enormously increased by the great length (about twenty-two inches) of the main gallery by which the displaced earth must be carried out. She worked for an hour, and in spreading the dirt about, inadvertently filled in the opening of the second nest. At length she flew away.

At ten o’clock a female arrived carrying a bee, and tried to find nest No. 2. She came to the wrong place, and worked about, here and there, for some minutes, holding the bee under the thorax, clasped by the second pair of legs. Being unsuccessful, she dropped her burden, and flew away for a few minutes. While she was gone we removed a leaf that had fallen over her nest, and on her return she at once descended upon the right spot, and began to scratch open the entrance, the bee being kicked backward with the rejected earth. When the way was clear, however, she picked it up, brought it toward the hole, dropped it, ran in and out, brought it nearer, ran in again, and turning around in the tunnel, seized the bee in her mandibles and pulled it down. This performance was due to the accidental obstruction of the gallery, for we afterward found that punctatus ordinarily flies directly into her nest, or, when it is closed, pauses on the wing to scratch an opening with the first legs. The bee is pushed backward a little as she goes in, but does not often project from under her abdomen.

At fifteen minutes after ten the worker from nest No. 1 brought in a bee, and from that time the two worked industriously. They showed some individuality in their ways, for No. 2 always closed her door when she went away, and never circled at all, while No. 1 invariably circled before leaving, and always left her nest open. To be sure, there was a female left on guard, so that perhaps she did not feel the need of caution.

Our wasps had not far to go for their victims. Forty feet away, on the eastern side of the island, was a steep declivity, and here, in the soft crumbly soil, was a great Halictus settlement. No prettier sight can be imagined than is presented by this colony on every sunny summer day. The whole bank is riddled with nests, and at the entrance of each stands a female bee, her tiny head exactly filling the opening. The bees are constantly arriving, laden with pollen, whereupon the sentinels politely back inward to make way for them. Into this scene of contented industry descends the ravaging Philanthus, taking guards and workers alike.

On the afternoon of the fourteenth of August our two wasps were in the full tide of affairs. No. 1 took in eleven bees within two hours, but her record was somewhat confused, as two other females were going in and out at the same time. We felt sure that neither of these was hunting, but one of them shared in the labor of the nest by helping with the work of excavation.

No. 2, however, was alone, so that we could keep a definite account of her comings and goings. We watched her from half past one until five, at which hour she came home without a load, and at once closed the nest for the night, after having stored thirteen bees in three hours and nine minutes. In some cases the capture of the bee occupied only one, two, or three minutes, while at other times she was gone much longer. At each return she stayed only an instant—just long enough to deposit the bee—inside the nest, and then spent a minute in carefully closing the hole. The wasps that were going in and out of nest No. 1 sometimes closed it when they went away, but this was done in an untidy fashion, quite different from the nicety and precision of No. 2.

At half after five o’clock the wasp that had been digging for some little time at nest No. 1 flew to nest No. 2, opened it, and attempted to enter, but was quickly driven out by the owner. She then dug a little in several other places, finally returning to sleep in the family home. On the next day we found that No. 2 was tolerating in her nest one of the females that had not yet begun to hunt, but whether it was the one she had rejected the night before or the fourth member of the sisterhood, we could not tell. On the eighteenth, three days later, the wasp had left this temporary home and made a nest for herself four feet away on the hillside. The males were still living in the first nest with two females.

When the weather was cold and cloudy punctatus remained closely housed within the nest, or, at most, came out to do an hour’s digging, and then disappeared. The warmer the weather, and the more brilliant the sunshine, the more rapidly they worked. When leaving the nest they would often creep out and walk around it three or four times before rising on their wings, and even then would sometimes alight once or twice before flying away. The males, especially, liked to stand about for a time, watching their more industrious sisters at their work. The females usually began the day with digging, and frequently closed it, toward night, in the same way.

In order to see the method of stinging, we at one time provided ourselves with a number of bees, and putting one of them into a bottle, introduced a wasp. She seized it almost immediately, with great vigor, and stung it once, under the neck, and then dragged it up and down the bottle by one antenna which was held in the mandibles. After a moment she shifted it and held it with the second legs in the usual way. We now put in another bee, which she also caught, stung in the same place, and then dropped without relaxing her hold of the first one. As she seemed to have nothing further to show us we released her, and after circling a little she took into her nest the bee that she was carrying.

In our next experiment we used a larger glass, thinking that with more space we might see malaxation. The instant that the wasp was introduced she grasped the bee with one rapid powerful motion, and stung it just under the neck as before. Then holding it with the second legs she began to fly about in the glass. We now introduced another bee, whereupon the first one was relinquished, and the second was treated in exactly the same way. The stinging was the beginning and the end of the operation, and when we released her she at once took the bee into the nest. There was no malaxation outside, and certainly there was none within, as was shown by the rapidity with which the wasps issued from the nest after storing the bees. We were successful in getting the wasps to sting only when we tried the experiment with those that were hunting. When those that had not yet begun to store their nests were put into the glass they paid no attention to the bees.

The victim of the sting of punctatus is killed at once. Life is extinct from the instant that the stroke is given. This is true also of the honey-bee that is the victim of Fabre’s Philanthus apivorus; but the explanation that he gives of the action of his wasp in thus dealing sudden death instead of paralyzing its foe—that the honey must be sucked out of the bee before it can be safely used as food for the larva—does not hold good in our case, since the honey that Halictus carries to mix with the pollen upon which her offspring are fed, is not removed.

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As time went on we found on the island two other Philanthus colonies, although that is rather too large a word to apply to them, since one consisted of four nests and the other of only two. When we came to excavate the nests of this species we were greatly astonished at the length of the gallery, and not until then did we properly appreciate the industry of these little wasps. It is no small undertaking to follow one of their tunnels for twenty-two inches, even when, as in this case, the greater part of it is parallel to the surface of the ground. We did not find distinct pockets, as the soil was very crumbly and fell in as we worked, but we came upon clumps of bees an inch or so to one side of the gallery and about three inches apart, with larvÆ in different stages of development. In one nest we found twenty-six bees in two clumps, some of them half-eaten, and some of them fresh, but all quite dead. We have no doubt that punctatus completely provisions one pocket and closes the opening from it into the gallery, before she starts another, making a series of six or eight independent cells. The provision for one larva is probably twelve or fourteen bees, the capture of which, in good weather, would be a fair day’s work.

That the males do not always stay on in their ancestral home is shown by an observation that we made on the only occasion that we ever saw this species in our garden. Nothing was stirring at half past three o’clock in the afternoon, and we had given up work and started for home, when, in going up an inclined part of the field, we noticed something in motion within a ragged-edged hole which ran obliquely into the ground. It seemed strange that a wasp should be beginning its nest at so late an hour; but a wasp it was, as we could plainly see when we took an attitude sufficiently humble. It was loosening the earth with its mandibles, and then pushing it backward with its hind legs and abdomen. We had scarcely settled down to watching it when a second one of the same species appeared, and with a good deal of fuss and flutter began to dig its hole close by. The spot chosen by this second one proved unsatisfactory, and another beginning was made in a new place. Again something was wrong, nor was a third choice any better. At last, however, the work was started in earnest, and might have been carried to a conclusion if we had not caught the little creature to satisfy a suspicion that had been growing in our minds. Yes, we were right. The worker was not a female making a nest for the rearing of her young, but a male punctatus, preparing a shelter for the night.

In the mean time the first wasp had pushed back such a quantity of earth that the hole was entirely closed, but every few minutes he came backing out to clear the way. At the end of half an hour all became quiet. The door remained closed, and doubtless the wasp was fast asleep. Putting a blade of grass and then an inverted tumbler over the nest, we left him for the night.

On removing the glass at half past seven the next morning, we found the nest open but the wasp not visible. At half past eight the head appeared just inside the hole, the long antennÆ twitching now to this side, now to that, as if an inspection were being made. Soon the head came out. The wasp stood for some minutes making a survey, looking to right and left with lively jerks of the body. Then, apparently concluding that the day was not far enough advanced, he came out, whirled around, and ran head-first into the nest. He probably took another nap, for all was quiet until just before ten o’clock, when the antennÆ appeared again. The survey was taken as before, first from within and then with the head in view. At last he flew out, and making three circles, each one wider than the last, about the place, flew away. He stayed out all day, and had not returned at half past three in the afternoon; but on going down at half past four we found that he had gone in and closed the door from below.

It is clear, then, that these males do not construct a new lodging every night, but return to the same spot to sleep. Other wasps creep into crevices. We have often found them, in the morning, in the holes of the posts of our cottage porch; but we are glad to be able to put it down to the credit of one male that he has sufficient foresight and industry to provide a sleeping-place, and sufficient intelligence to return to the spot when the declining sun warns him that evening is approaching.

While punctatus was in the height of its activity we found another species, P. ventilabris, taking bees of several genera and species into a ground nest. She also carried her prey with her second pair of legs, and whenever she left her nest she closed the door. She was a shy little thing, and did not approve of our interest in her. At one time, being startled by some movement on our part, she dropped her load and flew away. We placed the bee upon the closed nest, and when she came back with another, she paused and looked at it, took in the one she was carrying, and then returned for number one. This was placed on the threshold while she entered and turned around, and was then pulled in. Some wasps, notably C. ornata and our little tornado, refuse to take in their prey, even if they have caught it themselves, excepting in a regular succession of events; and thus the more reasonable conduct of ventilabris gains in interest.

To the west of Milwaukee, across the valley of the Menominee, rises a sandy hilltop which is a little insect kingdom by itself. Ants of course abound, and the gentle little solitary bees, with their loads of pollen, may be seen everywhere, seeming to melt into the ground, so quickly and quietly do they open their burrows. Here Oxybelus plys her trade of fly-catching, and graceful Ammophila dances with her shadow over the sunny ground, while Cerceris rests in her doorway with an air of leisurely superiority to the vulgar cares of life; and here, one day in early July, a sudden access of energy seemed to strike Aphilanthops frigidus, a wasp which we had found a year before taking in the wingless queens of ants. All at once they were digging everywhere, biting and scratching with great energy, and soon disappearing in the depths of their sandy tunnels. So deep is their primary gallery that even in this easy medium it takes them the best part of a day to get it ready for storing; but once finished it doubtless serves as a home through the season. It has at the entrance a little cup-shaped vestibule where the wasp drops the ant as she enters, running out of sight herself, and then, after she has turned around, coming back to pull it within. This nest is a very difficult one to excavate neatly, as the sand falls at the slightest touch.

A day or two after we had seen frigidus making her residential arrangements, we found twenty-five or thirty within a few feet of each other, working with great ardor at carrying in queens, the doors being left closed or open according to individual judgment. The steadiest workers brought one every forty minutes, scarcely pausing inside the nest, but others made long stays within, leaving the door closed. The ants were carried under the body with all the legs folded around them, but they were heavy things, and were often dropped as the wasp flew across the field, giving opportunities for robbery that were promptly taken advantage of. We picked up one of these ants and placed it in the doorway of a wasp that had just gone in. She came up twice, looked at it, and backed down again; but the third time she first touched it, then seized it and took it below. From another wasp that was just entering we took the ant she had dropped and moved it half an inch away. When she had turned and come up for it, she seemed surprised, came out and looked about, found it and dropped it in the doorway, going in herself to turn around as before. We seized this chance to move it again, and again she came out, found it, took it back, and dropped it. This was repeated five times, but when she took it in for the sixth time, after dropping it, she whirled around and picked it up so quickly that our malice was foiled.

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We were puzzled by the actions of a wasp that approached her nest again and again, but always circled away without entering, until looking closely we saw that she was pursued by two tiny flies. When she alighted and walked about awhile with her ant tucked under the third leg on one side, the flies alighted also and walked about behind her. In the end she evaded them by a sudden drop into her hole.

A wasp now came circling along with an ant in her grasp, and settled down between two small weeds that grew about four inches apart. She stood quiet a moment and then began to dig, but had evidently struck the wrong spot, for after a moment she moved and tried another place. Not finding the entrance, she rose and flew close under one of the plants and began to scratch again, but still in vain. For ten minutes she persisted, keeping within a few inches of the spot, and holding on to the ant all the time, although it was dreadfully in her way as she walked about. Then she dropped it and began to dig more vigorously, dividing her attention between the two spots she had attempted at first. She seemed troubled at having to leave the ant, and often picked it up and tried to hold it while she worked. Once in a while she would take it with her, and after circling about the spot would disappear, but in a few minutes she would return. It seemed to us that two little plants growing near together must have been her landmarks, and that probably she had been deceived by the likeness that those before us bore to the ones near her nest. Again and again she seemed to hesitate and think the matter over, but gradually one of the holes absorbed her more and more. At the end of an hour she was out of sight in it, and had carried her ant down, although she was still kicking out sand. It was evident that her memory had played her false, and that she had either covered her hole so neatly that she could not find the spot herself, or had missed the place entirely. She had accommodated herself to circumstances pretty well, although she ought to have realized earlier that it would be easier to dig one nest than two.

We now tried to excavate a nest, but could not follow the tunnel, although we found clumps of ants at different levels, some with larvÆ feeding on them. The deepest were eighteen inches down. Hoping to secure a guide, we borrowed an ant as it was dropped in the doorway and tied a thread to it. The wasp pulled it in and took it part way down with this attachment; but before any great depth was reached, the thread was seemingly bitten off, as we found the free end without the ant. A second attempt brought no better results.

So long as we were quiet the wasps did not notice us, but after being disturbed they became shy and circled about a good deal before entering. Some of the ants were completely paralyzed, while others moved their abdomens, legs, and mouth parts. All through the morning, the whole place was in a bustle, but when we came back, after eating our luncheon in a shady spot, quiet reigned; the colony seemed asleep, and although we waited for an hour not a wasp showed herself.

The ants that these wasps were bringing all had wings. The European genus Fertonius takes worker ants which can be picked up anywhere; but so far as we know, these queens leave the nest only at the time of their nuptial flight, after which the wings are lost. How then are they captured? Can it be that the wasps, though not much larger than their prey, descend into the home of the ants, bearding the lions in their den, and carrying off their young queens by force of arms? This smacks of heroism.

Much interested in the matter, we carefully examined the ant-hills of the neighborhood. Those on top of the hill had openings too small to admit frigidus, supposing she had wanted to enter, but down on the roadside below we found some larger doorways and sat down beside them. We had scarcely arrived when a frigidus appeared on the scene, alighting six feet away. That she should have come hunting so soon seemed almost too good to be true, but she certainly was not doing anything else. She did not dig, nor feed on the clover, nor circle about as though looking for her nest, but began to clean and brush herself assiduously. Then she climbed a tall grass blade, and swinging at the top went through some curious gymnastic performances. Then she brushed herself again, drawing her third legs over the sides of her abdomen. This went on from moment to moment, until half an hour had passed, and more than once the painful suspicion crossed our minds that this was some trifling male putting in the hours between breakfast and luncheon. One encouraging fact cheered us: aimless as the wasp appeared she was slowly drawing nearer and nearer to the nest; and at last, alighting on the top of a weed close by, she crouched there in a most peculiar attitude, and gazed intently at the opening. Absorbed and tense, she looked about to leap upon her prey; but after a time she relaxed and moved about a little. Presently she came close to the entrance and seemed on the point of going in; but the ants were swarming up and down, and we thought that perhaps that step required more courage than she possessed. At any rate, she did not enter, but hung about for some minutes and then flew away.

Was this a young wasp out on her first hunt? What strange antiphonal desires must have stirred at the sight of the nest, and how mysterious was the power that drew her to it! Was there in her brain any image of the queen she must seek and sting and carry away from among her guards and subjects? Or had she perhaps already achieved the adventure, and did the memory of the bitter nips that little ant jaws can give make it a harder task than it was the first time, when she risked the ills she knew not of? That she hesitated and carried on the work reluctantly seemed to show that her flesh was weak and needed the prick of conscience to drive it on. Had we here then the small beginnings of moral sense and perception of duty? Can it be that of such humble origin is the power that “doth preserve the stars from wrong”?

We went on with these meditations for several days while lingering, with gradually diminishing hopefulness, over one ant-hill after another. The wasps were carrying in winged queens by the score, but they did not come our way to find them; and although we ranged about widely, we failed to see the capture. Occasionally we met a frigidus hunting, running about on the ground and poking her head, not only into ant holes, but into holes of all sorts, and as we sometimes saw young queens (wingless however) starting to dig their nests, we thought these might be the object of the search. The weather was cold and windy, most unpropitious for swarming, and yet frigidus was working as briskly as ever; so that we began to feel sure that she could not depend upon meeting the queens outside the nest, but must enter to get them. Just as this point we received a letter from Mr. William M. Wheeler, well known as an authority on ants, saying that he felt very sure that the wasp could not extract the queens from the nest, but must find them running on the ground, just after the nuptial flight, before they dug their holes and started their colonies. Respecting this opinion, but still feeling unconvinced, we caught a wasp in a glass, and carrying it to an ant-hill, inverted it so that she was confined just over the entrance. After buzzing up and down for a moment, she alighted and walked calmly into the hole; but a fraction of a second later she came rushing madly out again, pursued by the most furious lot of ants that ever defended the home city against invasion. Down tumbled our air castles about courage and duty, for however frigidus gets her queens, it is not in that way. We have not yet seen the meeting and the capture, but hope that sometime we may be lucky enough to be on the right spot at the right time.