142 NOTES BY THE WAY. 



its nest in little cavities in rails and posts. But the 

 one with the bronze, or copper, bottom builds under 

 a stone. I discovered its nest one day in this wise : 

 I was lying upon the ground in a field, watching a 

 line of honey-bees to the woods, when my attention 

 was arrested by one of these native bees flying about 

 me in a curious, inquiring way. When it returned 

 the third time, I said, " That bee wants something of 

 me," which proved to be the case, for I was lying 

 upon the entrance to its nest. On my getting up, it 

 alighted and crawled quickly home. I turned over 

 the stone, which was less than a foot across, when 

 the nest was partially exposed. It> consisted of four 

 cells, built in succession in a little tunnel that had 

 been excavated in the ground. The cells, which 

 were about three quarters of an inch long and half as 

 far through, were made of sections cut from the leaf 

 of the maple cut with the mandibles of the bee, 

 which work precisely like shears. I have seen the 

 bee at work cutting out these pieces. She moves 

 through the leaf like the hand of the tailor through a 

 piece of cloth. When the pattern is detached she 

 rolls it up, and, embracing it with her legs, flies home 

 with it, often appearing to have a bundle dispropor- 

 tionately large. Each cell is made up of a dozen or 

 more pieces ; the larger ones, those that form its 

 walls, like the walls of a paper bag, are oblong, and 

 we turned down at one end, so as to form the bot- 

 tom : not one thickness of leaf merely, but thre* 

 or four thicknesses, each fragment of leaf lapping 



