THE ENEMIES OF THE GRASSHOPPER 



the earth. Indeed, we almost concluded that we were 

 doomed to complete failure, for it was not until we had 

 gone down between six and seven inches that we found, in 

 a little pocket, our wasp in company with three crickets, 

 upon one of which was a larva a day or two old. At the 

 time we knew nothing of the habits of Bembex spinolae, 

 and we were much astonished to find a wasp which evi- 

 dently fed her young from day to day. 



The contents of the nest were carefully conveyed to our 

 wasp-nursery at the cottage. The cricket that we had 

 seen taken in was dead, as was also the one upon which 

 the larva was feeding. The third one was alive, as was 

 shown by a rhythmic movement of the palp on the right 

 side. By the next day, however, this one also was dead. 



On the morning of the third day, July thirty-first, 

 the larva had eaten all of the first cricket and the greater 

 part of one of the others, leaving only the large hind legs. 

 Supplying the place of the mother, we killed two more 

 and put them into the tube. One of these was eight 

 millimeters long, this being about the size of those which 

 the wasp herself had caught, while the other was of 

 another species and much larger, being thirty milli- 

 meters long. Its size and kind, however, made no differ- 

 ence to the larva, which attacked this one next, although 

 there were two small ones yet untouched. It ate only 



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