XX MASON BEES 285 



two different species. But scratch away the cover of 

 cement and we recognise the cells and their layers of 

 tiny pebbles. Instead of building on a boulder yet 

 unoccupied, Chalicodoma muraria likes to utilise old 

 nests which have lasted through the year without 

 notable injury. The mortared dome has remained 

 much as it was at the beginning, so solid was the 

 masonry ; only it is pierced by a number of round 

 holes corresponding to the chambers inhabited by 

 the larvae of the past generation. Such dwellings, 

 only needing a little repair to put them in good 

 condition, economise much time and toil ; so Mason 

 Bees seek them, and only undertake new constructions 

 when old nests fail them. 



From the same dome come forth brothers and 

 sisters — reddish males and black females — all de- 

 scendants of the same bee. The males lead a 

 careless life, avoiding all labour, and only returning 

 to their clay dwellings for a brief courtship of their 

 ladies ; and they care nothing for the deserted dwell- 

 ing. What they want is nectar from flower-cups, 

 not mortar between their mandibles. But there are 

 the young mothers, who have sole charge of the 

 future of the family — to which of them will fall the 

 inheritance of the old nest ? As sisters they have 

 an equal right to it — so would human justice decide, 

 now that it has made the enormous progress of 

 freeing itself from the old savage right of primo- 

 geniture ; but Mason Bees have not got beyond the 

 primitive basis of property — the right of the first 

 comer. 



So when the time to lay has come, a bee takes 

 the first free nest which suits her and establishes herself 



