464 THE CANADIAN NATURALIST. [Dec, 



any species of its own family. The Quebec cells had no winter 

 protection ; they were found in a position exposed to a low tem- 

 perature during winter. I have not detected either of these 

 species constructing their nests, and whether they are filled with 

 honey, pollen, insects on their larvae, as stated by Westwood, p. 

 241, I cannot state positively, but I am led to believe that the 

 interior of fig. 1 is filled either with honey or pollen by the parent 

 insect. Neither of the cells, fig. 2, produced an insect. Probably 

 the low temperature destroyed the larva. 



Fig. 3 illustrates a mass of what, at first I took to be the 

 cocoons of a species of microgaster similar to 17, fig. 76, West- 

 wood's Int. to Mod. Class, of Ins., vol. ii. They were found 

 attached to a paling on St. Foy's road by Mr. Geo. J. Bowles, of 

 Quebec. I have since discovered that they are the eggs of a 

 species of geometer, probably the canker-worm figured in Harris's 

 Insects Injurious to Vegetation, p. 463. . 



Fig. 4 is the anterior right wing of a hymenopter, belonging 

 to the family Crabonidae, the genus and species of which are 

 unknown to me. The insect is completely black. Head wide ; 

 eyes reniform ; antennae inserted in front, thickened at their tips ; 

 face above the mandibles silvery ; wings iridescent, anterior wings 

 composed of eight, posterior, of seven cells ; posterior legs about 

 twice the length of anterior ; length from the base of antennae to 

 tip of abdomen five-twentieths of an inch. 



Fig. 5 represents the piece of a maple stump containing the cell 

 of the last described solitary wasp. It appears to be allied to that 

 of fig. 2 in its mode of mason-work. Instead of forming an exposed 

 oval cell made entirely of clay and sand, the parent insect selected 

 an old coleopterous larva hole which runs obliquely upwards in the 

 stump, and the cell of the hymenopter is near its exterior, as 

 seen in the figure, about seven-twentieths of an inch long, having 

 an interior as well as an exterior barrier of clay, represented by 

 the dots in the wood-cut. The intervening space is occupied by 

 an oblong thin cocoon, similar to a quill membrane. One species., 

 the Trypoxylon figulus of Europe, makes use of the holes of other 

 insects commenced in woodwork, by first enlarging and then plas- 

 tering them with a covering of fine sand ; and I have noticed that 

 when the American mason-wasp finds a suitable hole terminating 

 at a short distance from the entrance, that the clay used by 

 it is what closes the mouth of the cell, one of the wasps keeping 

 guard while the other is away procuring material for the work. 



