—86—. 



HANDLING WASPS WITHOUT HARM. 



(W. L. Wilder in Silence.) 



"It is a fact not generally known that if one holds his breath wasps, 

 bees, and hornets can be handled with impunity. The skin becomes 

 sting-proof, and, holding the insect by the feet and giving her full liberty 

 of action, you can see her drive her weapon against the impenetrable 

 surface with a force that lifts her body with every stroke; but let the 

 smallest quantity of air escape from the lungs and the sting will penetrate 

 at once. I have never seen an exception to this in 25 years' observation. 

 I have taught young ladies with very delicate hands to astonish their 

 friends by the performance of this feat, and I saw one so severely siung 

 as to require the services of a phwsician through laughing at a witty re- 

 mark of her sister, forgetting that laughing required breath. For a theory 

 in explanation I am led to believe that holding the breath partially closes 

 the pores of the skin. My experiments in that direction have not been 

 exact enough to be of any scientific value, but I am satisfied that it very 

 sensibly affects the amount of insensible perspiration." 



The above is .'^•ent us by Mr. J. \\. Smith, who adds: — "1 tried 

 it with a 9 Polistes and got stung ju.^t as 1 expected." 



We think it very probable (if the whole matter be not intended as 

 a practical joke to lead credulous people to suffer from their credulity,) 

 that the author of the above has happened to have experience only with 

 male specimens of the Hyinenoptera. In these parts and in Washington 

 also, as we should judge from Mr. Smith's experience, it takes more than 

 a holding of the breath to cause the aggressive activity of the business end 

 of a 9 wasp or hornet to drop into " innocuous desuetude." We will 

 however keep the matter in mind, and when next time we find the- irre- 

 pressible "small boy" daring the wrath of Bumblebees for the sake of a 

 few cells of honey, will tell him of this "easy method," and will at a safe 

 distance from boy and bee watch how it works. If we were given to 

 betting, we would give odds that after the experiment there would be no 

 holding of the " small bovs" breath. G. D. H. 



In the Stettiner Entomologische Zeitung, 1887, Vol. 48,- p. 314, the 

 following "self-acting" apparatus for separating the Insects froin siftings 

 is described : — " Into a wide-mouthed bottle place a cork through which 

 the stem of a wide glass funnel is fitted. Place the siftings into a round 

 pasteboard box which fits snugly to the mouth of the funnel and punch 

 into the bottom a series of small holes. The Insects will make for the 

 gleams of light, get out through the holes and eventually drop into the 

 bottle below." — All extremely ingenious, whether practical or not is an- 

 other question ! J. B. Smith. 



