242 NORTH AMERICAN INSECTS. 
tree, while another makes a globular paper-nest of combs 
under ground, which nest is sometimes a foot in diameter, 
and actually resembles a subterranean city, having houses 
and streets, the whole being surrounded and fortified with 
a paper wall. 
But of all the ichneumon tribe, probably the Horner 
(Vespa chartaria) is the most celebrated for its ingeniously- 
built dwelling, it being of a globular form and filled with 
cells, which are constructed of the paper which this insect 
manufactures out of wood. ‘These hornet’s nests are found 
every where in North and South America, either suspend- 
ed in the air or closely built around the branch of a tree or 
under the eaves of houses. They are a sort of solid, round. 
vessel, often more than a foot in diameter, the walls of 
which are of a white or gray color, and in appearance and 
thickness closely resemble thin pasteboard. Such a nest 
often contains a dozen or more combs, is several stories 
high, with hexagonal cells, and has its entrance, which is 
about the diameter of a finger, at the bottom. The inhab- 
itants of such a dwelling, several thousand in number, are 
composed of workers, females, and males, the latter of which 
are the largest. The workers and the females are provided 
with a sting, which is justly much dreaded, children hay- 
ing not unfrequently died from its effects, and adults often 
having experienced severe suffering from the same cause. 
The hornets are of a dark-brown color, and are known to 
every one who has spent much time in the country. 
It would be interesting, and possibly might be made very 
profitable, to institute experiments with the wood from 
which these insects manufacture their paper; for if a new 
material for the manufacture of paper could thus be discoy- 
ered, the fortunate discoverer would be well repaid, and the 
country would really be enriched by possessing agother source 
of revenue, and we should not be obliged to import so many 
rags from Trieste and other Austrian sea-ports. 
