THE GREAT O OLDEN DIGGER. 37 



she feel any hesitation as to what ought to he done next, hut 

 fell to work at once at carrying out more dirt. The weather, 

 although still hot, had become cloudy and so threatening that 

 we expected a down-pour of rain every moment, but this seemed 

 to make no difference to her. Load after load was brought up, 

 until, at the end of an hour, everything seemed completed to her 

 satisfaction. She came to the entrance and flew about, now this 

 way, and now that, repeating the locality study in the most 

 thorough manner, and then went away. At the expiration of 

 an hour we saw her approaching with a large, light green 

 meadow-grasshopper, which was held in the mouth and supported 

 by the fore legs, which were folded under. On arriving the 

 prey was placed, head first, near the entrance, while the depre- 

 dater went in, probably to reassure herself that all was right. 

 Soon she appeared at the door of the nest and remained motion- 

 less for some moments, gazing intently at her treasure. Then 

 seizing it (we thought by an antenna) she dragged it head first 

 into the tunnel. 



The laying of the eg^ did not detain her long. She was up 

 in a moment and began at once to throw earth into the nest. 

 After a little she went in herself and we could plainly hear her 

 humming as she pushed the loose material down with her head. 

 "When she resumed the work outside we interrupted her to catch 

 a little fly that we had already driven off several times just as it 

 was about to enter the nest. The Sphex was disturbed and flew 

 away, and this gave us an oportunity to open the burrow. The 

 grasshopper was placed on its back, with its head next to the 

 blind end of the pocketi and the legs protuding up into the tun- 

 nel. In digging out these nests we have found that by pushing 

 thei slender stem of a plant into the hole before the wasp fills it 

 up we are greatly aided in following the direction of the tunnel 

 and in finding the prey at the bottom. Before using tliis simple 

 device we often went astray and lost the nest. 



We found that the egg of the wasp, which was seven milli- 

 meters long, and rather slender, was placed on the under face of 

 the thorax at a right angle to its length, and parallel with the 



