84 ROMANCE OF THE INSECT WORLD CHAP. 



her legs. With her strong mandibles she quickly 

 cuts out the roundish portion she requires, as with a 

 pair of scissors, turning upon a pivot with her feet ; 

 and lest its weight should carry her to the ground, 

 just before the last fibre is severed she balances her- 

 self in the air for flight, and at the moment it parts 

 bears it off in her jaws in triumph. 



Anthocopa papaveris, the " abeille tapissiere" ol 

 Reaumur, as though fascinated by the brilliant colour, 

 fixes its choice of cell-lining upon the common scarlet 

 poppy. It is small, of a velvety black, ornamented with 

 white downy hairs on the margins of the segments of 

 the abdomen. Its burrows are perpendicular holes in 

 dry and sandy soils, perfectly cylindrical at first, 

 but swelled out below in the shape of a Florence 

 flask. The sides the bee stamps firm and smooth ; 

 then portion after portion, to the number of three or 

 four layers, is cut from the poppy, each morsel as it is 

 introduced into the cell being pressed and straightened 

 against the walls, to take out every curl and wrinkle 

 from the delicate tissue. The honied provision and 

 the solitary egg being committed to this cosy apart- 

 ment, the upholsterer carefully folds in the free ends 

 of the petals, a necessary precaution owing to the 

 nature of the soil, to prevent the encroachment of the 

 grains of sand. This done, the rest of the hole is 

 stopped with earth. 



Some of the exotic * species of Megachile, 

 as M. lanata and M. disjuncta, common to India, 

 form tubes of agglutinated particles of sand or 

 clay independently of a burrow. They also fill up 

 the hollows of tree-stems with clay cells, instead of a 



