CHAPTER I 



THE EUMENES 



A WASP-LIKE garb of black and yel- 

 low; a slender, graceful figure; wings 

 that are not spread flat when resting, but are 

 folded lengthwise in two ; the abdomen a sort 

 of chemist's retort, swelling into a gourd and 

 fastened to the thorax by a long neck which 

 first distends into a pear and then shrinks to 

 a thread; a leisurely and silent flight; lonely 

 habits. There we have a summary sketch of 

 the Eumenes. My part of the country pos- 

 sesses two species: the larger E. Amadei, 

 Lep., measures nearly an inch in length; the 

 other, E. pomiformis, Fabr., 1 is a reduction 

 of the first to half the scale. 



Similar in form and colouring, both pos- 

 sess a like talent for architecture; and this 



1 1 include three species promiscuously under this one 

 name, that is to say, E. pomiformis, Fabr., E. bipuncfis, 

 Sauss., and E. dubius, Sauss. As I did not distinguish be- 

 tween them in my first investigations, which date a very 

 long time back, it is not possible for me to-day to attribute 

 to each of them its respective nest. But their habits are 

 the same, for which reason this confusion does not injure 

 the order of ideas in the present chapter. — Author's Note. 

 I 



