The Hunting Wasps 



and a small one at that. I bow before the 

 facts without hoping ever to understand this 

 inversion of the parts played by each insect. 

 To be able to rid yourself easily of a mortal 

 enemy who is contemplating the ruin of your 

 family and who would furnish a nice little 

 meal for it, to be able to do that and not do it 

 when the enemy is there, within reach of you, 

 watching you, defying you : this is the height 

 of animal aberration. But aberration is not 

 the right word; let us rather speak of the 

 harmony of created things, for, since this 

 wretched little Fly has her tiny part to play 

 in the general order, the Bembex must needs 

 respect her and like a craven flee before her, 

 else there would long since have been none 

 of her left in the world. 



Let us now tell the history of this parasite. 

 Among the nests of the Bembex, we find very 

 frequently some that are occupied at the same 

 time by the larva of the Wasp and by other 

 larvae, strangers to the family and gluttonous 

 companions of the first. These strangers 

 are smaller than the Bembex' nurseling, tear- 

 shaped and of a purplish colour, due to the 

 tint of the baby-food that shows through the 

 transparent body. They vary in number: 

 there are sometimes half-a-dozen of them, 

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