126 INSECT LIFE ix 



regarding things from a lofty height, and considering 

 unworthy of close examination the petty fact, which, 

 however, was to serve to corroborate his transcendent 

 views and grant reason to animals, may have in his 

 turn committed an error, conversely and very 

 excusably, by taking a wasp for one of the 

 Crabronides ? I could almost declare it is so, and 

 for the following reasons. Wasps, if not always at 

 any rate frequently, bring up their family on animal 

 food, but instead of provisioning each cell they dis- 

 tribute nourishment singly to the larvae, and several 

 times in the day ; feeding them from their mouths 

 with soft pap, as the father and mother do young 

 birds. This pap consists of mashed insects, ground 

 down in the jaws of the nursing wasp ; the insects 

 preferred for it are Diptera, especially the common 

 fly ; if fresh meat offers itself it is largely used. 

 Who has not seen wasps penetrate into our kitchens, 

 or dart on the joints in a butcher's shop, cut 

 off some scrap of flesh which suits them, and carry 

 away a tiny spoil for the use of their larvae ? 

 When half-closed shutters allow a ray of light to fall 

 on the floor of a room where the house-fly is taking 

 a comfortable nap, or brushing its wings, who has 

 not seen a wasp suddenly enter, pounce upon it, 

 crush it in its jaws, and flee with the booty ? This 

 again is a dainty meal for the carnivorous nurslings. 

 Sometimes the prey is at once dismembered, some- 

 times on the way, sometimes at the nest. The 

 wings, in which there is no nourishment, are cut off 

 and rejected ; the feet, poor in juices, are also some- 

 times disdained. There remains a mutilated corpse, 

 head, thorax, abdomen, or part thereof, which 



