366 



THE INSECT WORLD. 



hiding-place to find the road before it free. The XylocopcB pass the 

 winter in the pupa state, and the perfect insects, with wings of a 

 beautiful metallic violet, appear in the spring, but are not found ins 

 this country. 



Other solitary bees have their hind legs unsuited for the gathering! 



Fig. 342. — Rose Megachile {Megachile ceiiiiiiicularis). 



of pollen, but have the rings of the abdomen furnished with hairs fc 

 that purpose. Such are the ]Mason Bees of Re'aumur, belonging t 

 the genera Osniia and Chalkodofua,^ which build their nests agains 

 walls ^\•ith tempered earth, which become Yory hard. 



* At a meeting of the Entomological Society of London, Feb. i8th, 1867, M 

 Newman exhibited the lock of a door, one of several which in 1866 were found . 

 the Kent Waterworks, Deptford, to be completely filled and choked up with nes 

 of Osmia Bicornis : a portion of the nest had been forced out by the insertion of tl 



