NOTES, CAPTURES, ETC. 189 



men belonging to H.M. steam sloop ' Vixen,' about six feet from 

 the ground I saw what appeared to me to be a handful of mud 

 thrown at it, and lodging on the upper portion of a raised anchor 

 which surmounts the inscription. Upon removing a small portion 

 it disclosed a tomb containing eleven full-grown living larvte of a 

 Sciapldla (very probably S. perter'ana) ; the wretch who has 

 entombed these, thought I, evidently did not believe in cremation. 

 They had been stung without doubt, which had produced 

 paralysis ; at the bottom of the tomb was the small yellow larva 

 of Odynerus pictus. I opened two, each contained the same. I 

 brought home the larvse, and forwarded two to Mr. Barrett for 

 identification. I again visited the spot on the 24th, when I 

 captured the lad}', who had in the meantime re -plastered the cells 

 I had broken, and had completely provisioned and sealed up two 

 others ; these two I opened on July 13th, and found the larvae of 

 0. inctus full fed, and the larva in the cell completed on the 24th 

 about to commence its silken cocoon ; I removed it into a glass 

 tube, in which it completed its winter domicile in about four days. 

 From these observations it will be perceived that the larva of the 

 future wasp is full-fed in eighteen days from the completion of 

 the cell ; these cells were placed on the south side and exposed to 

 the full rays of the mid-da}^ son. The larvae of the Sciaphila that 

 I removed on my first visit were only able to turn round from 

 first to last, having lost all power of locomotion or contraction of 

 the body : they remained in this state about sixteen days, when 

 they began to dry up, although they were kept in a glass tube. — 

 G. C. Bignell; Stonehoase, July 18, 1881. 



Queen Hornet at work. — On June 24th, whilst working in 

 my potting shed, I became aware of a powerful buzz overhead, 

 and looking up I saw a monster hornet making its way to an egg- 

 shaped globe, about the size of a lemon, suspended from the roof. 

 It was a thin shell of mortar, with a hole at the bottom sufficiently 

 large to enable me to see the hornet at work inside ; and I think 

 it will be as surprising to others as it was to me to know that, 

 although when I first observed her the shell was perfectly empty, 

 by the morning of the 28th — less than five days — she had con- 

 structed twenty-six cells : two were empty, seventeen contained 

 eggs, five had good-sized larvEe, and the remaining two were 

 already sealed up for the pupa stage. At this juncture I deemed 

 it prudent to secure the entire " menage," mother and all, which 



