250 EYE SPY 
I 
by you. Hereditary instinct at least ought to 
teach you that your drum should play second fid- 
dle to that hornet's humming music. I remem- 
ber once being the witness of the sad fate of an 
ancestor of yours who drummed not wisely but 
too well. He was monopolizing the neighbor- 
hood, just as you are doing now, when I noticed 
his principal effort was suddenly cut short in the 
middle in a most unusual manner. If he had 
been a singer I would have supposed some rival 
had clapped a hand over his mouth, so suddenly 
was the song abbreviated. In another moment 
there was a rustling among the leaves, as some- 
thing fell from the tree in his immediate neigh- 
borhood. Down, down it dropped, its passage to 
the ground accompanied by one or two short, 
sharp, spasmodic tattoos on that same noisy drum. 
The object fell among some rocks, but before I 
could reach the spot the humming sound of a 
sand -hornet greeted my ears, and in a moment 
more the insect took flight directly across my 
path, and, what was more, he was not alone. 
Would you know who accompanied him ? Look 
then on the picture on page 252, and have a care, 
my noisy friend, for the lineal descendant of that 
sand -hornet now hovers outside my doorway. 
He has a grudge against your tribe, and he is 
even now on your scent. Perhaps you may be 
interested to know what the hornet did with that 
