The Mason-bees 



aquiver, they scrape with the tips of their 

 mandibles and rake with their front tarsi to 

 extract atoms of earth and grains of sand, 

 which, rolled between their teeth, become 

 impregnated with saliva and form a solid 

 mass. The work is pursued so vigorously, 

 that the worker lets herself be crushed under 

 the feet of the passers-by rather than abandon 

 her task. 



On the other hand, the Mason-bee of the 

 Walls, who seeks solitude, far from human 

 habitations, rarely shows herself on the beaten 

 paths, perhaps because these are too far from 

 the places where she builds. So long as she 

 can find dry earth, rich in small gravel, near 

 the pebble chosen as the site of her nest, that 

 is all she asks. 



The Bee may either build an entirely new 

 nest on a site as yet unoccupied, or she may 

 use the cells of an old nest, after repairing 

 them. Let us consider the former case first. 

 After selecting her pebble, the Mason-bee of 

 the Walls arrives with a little ball of mortar 

 in her mandibles and lays it in a circular pad 

 on the surface of the stone. The forelegs 

 and above all the mandibles, which are the 

 mason's chief tools, work the material, which 

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