The Hunting Wasps 



The poor thing can hardly flutter from one 

 mulberry-tree to the next, where it stops to 

 pant in the thick leafage, half-choked with 

 melting fat, a martyr to its passion for 

 Weevils. 



October brings us the slender White Wag- 

 tail, half pearly grey, half white, with a large 

 black-velvet chest-protector. The graceful 

 little bird, trotting along and cocking up its 

 tail, follows the ploughman almost under the 

 horses' feet and picks the grubs in the new- 

 turned furrow. About the same time the 

 Skylark arrives, first in little companies sent 

 out as scouting-partles, next in countless bat- 

 talions, which take possession of the corn- 

 fields and fallow land, with their plentiful 

 setaria-seeds, the bird's usual fare. Then, in 

 the plain, amid the universal glitter of dew- 

 drops and rime-crystals hanging from every 

 blade of grass, the treacherous mirror shoots 

 forth its intermittent flashes in the rays of the 

 morning sun; then the little Owl, released by 

 the hunter's hand, makes his short flight, 

 alights, starts up again convulsively, rolling 

 frightened eyes ; and the Lark arrives, dipping 

 on the wing, curious to obtain a closer view of 

 the bright apparatus or the grotesque bird. 

 He is there, in front of you, a dozen yards 

 244 



