SEVERAL LITTLE WASPS 



wasp. These colored matches were a great convenience 

 in marking nests, and as we were using them constantly, 

 we did not guess, for a time, what the trouble was. For 

 half an hour she went and came, circling about, alight- 

 ing upon plants, and seeming entirely absorbed in 

 examining them with the minutest care, even alighting 

 upon our hands with most engaging friendliness, but 

 pretending all the time that the nest was naught to her. 

 When the offending object was removed she hurried 

 in at once and resumed her work. The storing was not 

 begun until the next morning, when she took in six 

 caterpillars of very different sizes, at intervals of from 

 ten to twenty minutes, and then filled the hole. We 

 hoped to find the little chamber arranged as in reni- 

 formis, but had not skill enough to excavate in such a 

 way as to show the internal plan. It is remarkable that 

 this genus, with only one set of tools for all its species, 

 has worked out such different styles of architecture, the 

 ground nests bearing no resemblance to those cut out 

 of woody stalks ; and its flexibility is shown in the use 

 of empty snail shells by a foreign species, as well as 

 by capra's habit of partitioning off convenient crevices 

 found ready made. 



The prettiest nests that we have seen in stems are 

 those of Plenoculus peckhamii, which separates its 



95 



