^ ( xliv ) 



larva down by the ' neck ' as usual. But still it could not be 

 wholly contained in the chamber, and had to be dragged out 

 once more for further digging : this time, however, a new 

 difficulty arose ; it was so far down that the Sphex, standing 

 over the hole, could only grasp the extreme tip of its body 

 (posterior end), so that when she drew it up there was nowhere 

 for the fore limbs to grip ! Thus, every time she tried, the 

 larva fell down to the bottom of the hole again, and she began 

 to get very agitated. 



" At last, after ten efforts she managed somehow to get a 

 grip with the forelegs, and so pulled the larva out as at first 

 described, enlarged the chamber once more, and pulled the 

 larva down for the seventh — and last— time; for now it 

 fitted wholly in the chamber and none of it was visible when 

 one looked down the burrow. After a pause — quite remark- 

 ably short — for oviposition, the wasp came out and proceeded 

 to fill up the hole in the usual way, by biting oft' small lumps 

 of soil, putting them down and ramming them in with her 

 head, but making very little use of the method of scratching 

 loose earth backwards. When she had all but finished I 

 caught her (and. send her to you for naming), finishing off the 

 burrow myself lest her progeny should suffer ! (But I did not 

 bite off small lumps of soil and ram them down with my 

 head.) 



" There are one or two points worth remarking : — 



" 1. Kepeated efforts to get a large larva into a chamber 

 too small for it. This seems to imply that the wasp digs a 

 chamber of orthodox size, and finds larvae aftenvards. Does 

 she use larvae of varying size, or was she inexperienced ? 



" 2. The larva must be dragged down by the anterior 

 extremity. One sees no reason why this is necessary. 



" 3. On the whole the wasp works quietly. The pro- 

 longed, high-pitched, penetrating, buzz which S. marginatus 

 makes the whole time she is burrowing, so that one often 

 hears her at work long before one sees her, is replaced in this 

 species by a short buzz when the armful of earth is put down. 

 Also, when she had to pusli her way out past the larva in the 

 too small burrow she gave a buzz which one could easily 

 imagine to express vexation ! " 



