234 INSECTS. 



ceptacle for her own young. This, as Mr. Smith observes, 

 is far more in accordance with the common course of 

 nature than, as has been usually supposed, that the 

 young Cuckoo Bee should eat the food provided for 

 another and so starve that other ; for, as he says, " nature 

 I have never observed to be thus wasteful of animal 

 life, such a proceeding is unnecessary and therefore 

 unlikely." 



This remark finds an illustration in the system of prey, 

 the whole principle of which is adverse to such waste of 

 life ; this system both guarding animals from a linger- 

 ing death of old age and starvation, and rendering their 

 death immediately conducive to the life and enjoyment 

 of others. 



There are five genera of Cuckoo Bees. The first, 

 Nomada (PL IX., fig. 4), are elegantly formed Bees, 

 with nearly hairless bodies and wasp-like colouring, 

 being banded with black, red-brown, and yellow, whence 

 they are commonly called " Wasp Bees." They are 

 parasitic on species both of Andrenidse and Apidae. N. 

 sexfasciata, one of the largest of the species, may often 

 be seen in numbers flying noiselessly over a colony of the 

 long-horned Bee. It is half an inch in length. 



Nomada contains twenty-four species, varying in size 

 from one-sixth to the half of an inch. 



The remaining genera, Epeolus, Ccelioxys, Stelis, and 

 Melecta, contain some exceedingly pretty species, but 

 are less showy than the Nomada. They are generally of 

 a glossy black, with more or less white, creamy, or 

 yellow down about the head and thorax, and sometimes 

 with white stripes or bands of white down upon the 

 abdomen. Melecta luctuosa is especially beautiful, of 

 "shining jet spotted with snow white." Ccelioxys is 



