THE HOOP-SHAVER BEE. 23 



converted the razor into a plane or spokeshave. The exact 

 amount of edge which might be shown was regulated by screws, 

 and the guard itself could be removed at pleasure, so as to 

 allow of the razor being sharpened. 



Now let us see if we can find any examples of the Plane or 

 Spokeshave in Nature. 



I TRACE at least one example of the Plane in the insect 

 world. More than a hundred years ago, that very observant 

 naturalist, Gilbert White, noticed a bee performing a curious 

 task. She was running up the stem of the garden campion, 

 holding her jaws extended, and stripping off the down with 

 all the dexterity of a hoop-shaver. She collected a bundle 

 nearly as large as herself, and then flew away with it. What 

 she did with her burden he knew not, but the history of the 

 insect has been told fully, though briefly, by Mr. F. Smith, in 

 his " Catalogue of British Hymenoptera :" 



"Although the species belonging to this genus are numerous, 

 and are found both in the Old and New World, there is only 

 one found in this country, Antliidium manicatum ; this is truly 

 a summer bee, not making its appearance before the latter part 

 of June or beginning of July. 



" This insect, so far as my own observation has enabled me to 

 ascertain, does not construct its own burrow, but makes use of 

 any hole which is adapted to its purpose. I once detected a 

 bee entering the hole above the wheel of the sash-line in a 

 summer-house ; but its nests are most commonly formed in the 

 holes bored in old willow stumps by Cossus ligniperda (the Goat- 

 moth) : formerly they were easily obtained in Battersea Fields, 

 where the willows abounded. 



" It is probable that when the parent insect has selected one 

 of these ready-formed tunnels, she enlarges the end used as the 

 depository of the nest, and this is easily effected, as the stumps 

 in question, at the depth of a couple of inches, consist of soft 

 decayed wood. 



" The chamber being formed, the bee collects a quantity of 

 down from woolly-stemmed plants, with which she forms an 

 outer coating. She then constructs a number of cells for the 

 reception of the pollen, or food of the larva ; they consist of a 

 woolly material, mixed with some glutinous matter which 



