104 NATURAL HISTORY. [CH. VI. 



made, it makes no scruple to appropriate it. Reau- 

 mur, being once disturbed by a noise in his study, 

 found that it arose from the gnawing of a piece of 

 paper which these insects had attacked. A few 

 only of the community are architects ; the rest hav- 

 ing other appropriate employments. The females, 

 for there are as many as three hundred, unlike the 

 queen-bee, do not pass their lives in receiving the 

 homage of their subjects, but perform every species 

 of labour. The neuters, however, as among bees, 

 are the true workers. They build the nest, and fo- 

 rage for food for the males, females, and the young. 

 The worms are not looked up in a cell surrounded 

 with food, but require to be fed, like the young of 

 birds. " I saw," says Reaumur, " a female wasp, 

 which had entered the vespiary with the belly of an 

 insect ; this she contrived by degrees to swallow, 

 after which she ran to various cells, and, disgorging 

 that which she had eaten, distributed it among the 

 brood of worms." Hence it appears, that it not 

 only procured the food, but prepared it by a partial 

 digestion. The wasp is particularly fond of the 

 belly of the bee ; it is a choice bit which it eagerly 

 seeks. It will watch for hours at the door of a 

 bee-hive, pounce upon some unfortunate bee which 

 is about to enter, and tumbling it to the ground, in 

 a trice separate, with its two serrated teeth, the 

 tender abdomen, containing the soft intestines and 

 the honey-bag, from the dry and hard chest of the 

 insect : having secured its prey, it hurries away to 

 its habitation. The large blue-bottle fly is another 

 delicate morsel greatly coveted by the wasp ; and 

 so well aware are some butchers of the service done 

 by the wasps in preventing the fly from blowing 

 their meat, that they bribe them to their stalls with 

 pieces of liver. As soon as its appetite is satisfied, 

 either by flesh or fruit, the worker carries to the 

 nest a portion of its prey. When the insect enters 

 the common dwelling, those whose labours kept 



