The Tribulations of the Mason-bee 



bee's offspring must needs be stupidly sacri- 

 ficed on the top of provisions which will only 

 grow mouldy and useless! I should be re- 

 duced to the gloomy lucubrations of a Scho- 

 penhauer if I once let myself begin on para- 

 sitism. 



Such Is a brief sketch of the two para- 

 sites of the Chalicodoma of the Pebbles, true 

 parasites, consumers of provisions hoarded 

 on behalf of others. Their crimes are not 

 the bitterest tribulations of the Mason-bee. 

 If the first starves the Mason's grub to death, 

 if the second makes it perish in the egg, there 

 are others who have a more pitiable ending in 

 store for the worker's family. When the 

 Bee's grub, all plump and fat and greasy, has 

 finished its provisions and spun its cocoon 

 wherein to sleep the slumber akin to death, 

 the necessary period of preparation for its 

 future life, these other enemies hasten to the 

 nests whose fortifications are powerless 

 against their hideously ingenious methods. 

 Soon on the sleeper's body lies a nascent grub 

 which feasts in all security on the luscious 

 fare. The traitors who attack the larvae in 

 their lethargy are three in number: an An- 

 thrax, a Leucospis and a microscopic dagger- 

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