20 
sometimes do not accomplish their object, and amongst them the 
following examples :— 
M. Fabre took ten bees, marked them on the back with a ~ 
spot of white and put them ina bag. He then carried them half 
a kilometre in one direction, stopping at a point where an old 
cross stands by the wayside, and whirled the bag rapidly round his 
head ; he then started off back in the opposite direction, and 
carried his prisoners to a distance from their home of three 
kilometres ; here he again whirled them round, and then let them 
go one by one. They made one or two turns round him, and 
then flew off in the direction of home. In the meantime his 
daughter Antonia was on the watch. ‘The first bee did the mile 
and three quarters in a quarter of an hour ; some hours afterwards 
two more returned ; the other seven did not reappear. He tried 
five other experiments, with the result that out of 144 bees, 47 
found their way home and the others did not. 
The writer then gave some examples of actions which appear 
to be perfect, instancing amongst others the following :—The 
Ammophila (a solitary wasp) having built her cell, places in it, as 
food for her young, the full grown caterpillar of a moth, Noctua 
Segetum. Now if the caterpillar were uninjured, it would struggle 
to escape, and almost inevitably destroy the egg; nor would it 
permit itself to be eaten. On the other hand, if it were killed, it 
would decay and soon become unfit for food. The wasp, how- 
ever, avoids both horns of the dilemma. Having found her prey, 
she pierces with her sting the membrane between the head and 
the first segment of the body, thus nearly disabling the caterpillar, 
and then proceeds to inflict eight more wounds between the fol- 
lowing segments, lastly crushing the head, and thus completely 
paralyzing her victim, but not actually killing it, so that it lies help- 
less and motionless, but, though living, let us hope insensible. The 
spots selected are exactly those occupied by the ganglia, no others 
among the innumerable points which might have been chosen 
would have answered the purpose ; not one wound is misplaced or 
without effect. 
Eumenes (another wasp) like Ammophila, stores up the vic- 
tims once for all ; they are grievously wounded, but not altogether 
paralyzed. The wretched caterpillars lie in a wriggling mass at the 
bottom of the cell ; a clear space is left above them, and in this 
space from the summit of the cell, the delicate egg of the wasp is 
suspended by a fine thread, so that, even if touched by a cater- 
pillar in one of its convulsive struggles, it would simply swing away 
in safety. When the young grub is hatched, it suspends itself to 
this thread by a silken sheath, in which it hangs head downwards 
over its victims. Does one of them struggle: quick as lightning 
it retreats up the sheath out of harm’s way. 
ee Eee 
