242 WASPS AND THEIR WAYS 



But clever as she was, she may not have 

 been clever enough to escape the brilliant 

 green little rascal that lay in v^ait. For she 

 too had her chrysis, that ran swiftly about 

 in her absence, evidently scenting the wasp 

 whose retreat she could not find. Whether 

 Robin Hood did or did not find the right 

 hole between the shingles in time to de- 

 fraud the wasp of her honest labours, could 

 not be discovered. 



The carpenter or wood-boring wasps 

 frequently use any convenient opening for 

 their nests, some having been discovered 

 occupying holes in the mortar of a brick 

 wall. 



Trypoxylon is a slender-waisted black 

 little carpenter, ornamented with a red 

 girdle in one species, and with white hairs 

 on her legs in another. The red-girdled 

 Trypoxylon, or rubrocinctum, was one 

 summer watched making her nests in a 

 straw-stack. " The stack had been cut ofi" 

 perfectly smooth on one side, so that many 



