THE SAND-WASPS. 263 



be imprisoned, and as they are usually at least as 

 large as their captor, it is quite impossible for the 

 latter to make use of her wings in conveying them to 

 her nest. The whole of the journey, therefore, often 

 a distance of many feet, has to be accomplished on 

 foot, the victim being carried under the body of the 

 Ammophila, and the perseverance displayed by the 

 latter is most astonishing. Arrived at the burrow, the 

 victim is soon deposited in its last resting-place, and 

 the Ammophila then sets to work to fill up the cavity, 

 bringing fragments of dirt in her mandibles and 

 scratching the earth into it with her fore-feet, until 

 it is brought to a level with the surrounding surface. 

 Ray and Willoughby observed the female of this or a 

 nearly allied species {A. arenaria), after filling up the 

 mouth of her burrow, mark its position by means of 

 a couple of fir-leaves ; this observation, however, does 

 not appear to have been repeated. 



In these habits most of the species of this group of 

 Hymenoptera agree. Nearly all of them burrow either 

 in the sandy ground or in old trees and posts, and pro- 

 vision the cells thus formed with the half-dead bodies 

 of spiders and insects. The insects selected for this 

 purpose belong to almost every order, and are taken 

 in both the larva and perfect states, but each species 

 of these predaceous Hymenoptera appears to confine 

 itself exclusively to one or two kinds of insects in 

 provisioning its nest. Where one victim is large 

 enough to afford a sufiicient supply of food to the 

 voracious footless grub for whose support it is 

 destined, only one is enclosed in a cell But those 

 species which store the larders of their expected 

 family with smaller game, increase the numbers of 

 their victims as the latter decrease in size, so that as 



