126 



HISTORY OF 



various tribes that live in solitude ; these lay their 

 eggs in a hole for the purpose, and the parent 

 dies long before the birth of its offspring. In the 

 principal species of the Solitary Wasps, the insect 

 is smaller than the working wasp of the social 

 kind. The filament, by which the corslet is 

 joined to the body, is longer and more distinctly 

 seen, and the whole colour of the insect is blacker 

 than in the ordinary kinds. But it is not their 

 figure, but the manners of this extraordinary in- 

 sect, that claim our principal regard. 



From the end of May to the beginning of July, 

 this wasp is seen most diligently employed. The 

 whole purpose of its life seems to be in contriv- 

 ing and fitting up a commodious apartment for 

 its young one, which is not to succeed it till the 

 year ensuing. For this end it is employed, with 

 unwearied assiduity, in boring a hole into the 

 finest earth some inches deep, but not much wider 

 than the diameter of its own body. This is but a 

 gallery leading to a wider apartment, destined for 

 the convenient lodgment of its young. As it al- 

 ways chooses a gravelly soil to work in, and where 

 the earth is almost as hard as stone itself, the digg- 

 ing and hollowing this apartment is an enterprise 

 of no "small labour. For effecting its operations, 

 this insect is furnished with two teeth, which are 

 strong and firm, but not sufficiently hard to pene- 

 trate the substance through which it is resolved 

 to make its way : in order therefore to soften that 

 earth which it is unable to pierce, it is furnished 

 with a gummy liquor, which it emits upon the 

 place, and which renders it more easily separable 



