CRABRO 



of unceasing toil through the long hours of the second 

 night. We began to wonder if she would ever finish her 

 task. Wonderful though she was, we had grown a little 

 weary of our long session of watching. We had been 

 glad that she worked through the first night; it was 

 creditable to her and interesting to us, and we admired 

 her even more for sticking to it through the second, but 

 when it looked as though we might have to remain by 

 her side through another long day, watching an endless 

 series of loads as they were carried out, we confess that 

 we thought she was rather overdoing it. Gradually, 

 however, she slowed up her work, taking two or three 

 minutes to make a journey down and up. At last, at just 

 nine o'clock, her head appeared at the top of the stalk, 

 and after a slight hesitation she flew away. The nest was 

 completed. 



We have studied wasps for a number of years, and we 

 feel that we are on terms of more or less intimacy with 

 many of the species, but never before have we known 

 one to work after day was done. We have often gone 

 out with a lantern at bedtime for a tour of inspection 

 among our nests, and have always found the inhabitants 

 quiet and presumably asleep. The social wasps are very 

 industrious, but during the hot nights of July they are 

 to be seen clustered together on the outside of their paper 



