UPIIOLSTEREE-BEES. 45 



decay ; and the liole wliicli is dug in it is mncli less neat 

 and regular tlian tliat of the carpenter-bees, while the 

 division of the chambers is nothing more than the rubbish 

 produced during the excavation. 



The provision which is made for the grub consists of 

 flies or gnats piled into the chamber, but without the nice 

 order remarkable in the spiral columns of green caterpillars 

 provided by the mason- wasp {Odynerus murarius). The 

 most remarkable circumstance is, that in some of the 

 species, when the grub is about to go into the pupa state, 

 it spins a case (a cocoon), into which it interweaves 

 the wings of the flies whose bodies it has previously 

 devoured. In other species, the gnawings of the wood are 

 employed in a similar manner. 



Upholsterer-Bees. 



In another part of this volume we shall see how certain 

 caterpillars construct abodes for themselves, by cutting oif 

 portions of the leaves or bark of plants, and uniting them 

 by means of silk into a uniform and compact texture ; but 

 this scarcely appears so wonderful as the prospective 

 labours of some species of bees for the lodgment of their 

 progeny. AVe allude to the solitary bees, known b}^ the 

 name of the leaf-cutting bees, but which may be denomi- 

 nated more generally upholsterer-bees, as there are some 

 of them which use other materials beside leaves. 



One. species of our little upholsterers has been called the 

 poppy-bee (Osmia papaveris, Late.), from its selecting the 

 scarlet petals of the poppy as tapestry for its cells. Kirby 

 and Spence express their doubts whether it is indigenous to 

 this country : we are almost certain that we have seen the 

 nests in Scotland. (J. E.) At Largs, in Ayrshire, a 

 beautiful sea-bathing village on the Firth of Clyde, in July, 

 1814, we found in a footpath a great number of the 

 cylindrical perforations of the poppy-bee. Ec'aumur 

 remarked that the cells of this bee which he found at 

 Bercy, were situated in a northern exposure, contrary to 

 what he had remarked in the mason-bee, which prefers the 

 south. The cells at Largs, however, were on an elevated 



