CARPENTERS AND WOOD-WORKERS 99 



it by painting its surfaces, dipping it in creosote, 

 or coating it with some other substance noxious 

 to insects. 



Having obtained a post suitable for her purpose, 

 the Carpenter Bee sets about her work by cutting 

 with her jaws an oblique tunnel about half an inch 

 in diameter. Before this has extended far into 

 the wood she alters the direction of further excava- 

 tion and makes her boring run straight downwards. 

 As she gnaws the wood it is reduced to the condition 

 of sawdust, and this all has to be carried out of 

 the hole, or her further efforts would be brought 

 to a standstill. But instead of scattering the 

 excavated material, as some of the miners in sand 

 and earth do, she keeps it all together in a heap to 

 be available for use later on. 



She cuts and cuts away until her tube is a foot 

 or fifteen inches deep and of equal width through- 

 out its length. At the bottom she gives it a turn 

 again to the exterior. Having performed this great 

 work, she proceeds to what, by comparison, may 

 be termed cabinet-work, the finer and more intricate 

 section of the carpenter's art. Her task is to divide 

 this deep shaft into about a dozen chambers, each 

 about an inch in depth, each for the reception 

 of a single egg and a sufficiency of food for the full 

 development of the bee-grub that is to hatch out. 

 This takes the usual form among these solitary bees, 

 of mixed pollen and honey. 



Having made such a deposit at the bottom of 

 her burrow, she has recourse to her heap of saw- 



