More Hunting Wasps 



mobility of the palpi, above all without in- 

 juring the cephalic centres and thus pro- 

 ducing death, namely, to reach with her sting 

 the two fibres actuating the fangs, fibres as 

 fine as a hair. 



I insist upon this point. Despite their 

 extreme delicacy, these two filaments must 

 be injured directly; for, if it were enough 

 for the sting to inject its poison " there or 

 thereabouts," the nerves of the palpi, so 

 close to the first, would undergo the same 

 intoxication as the adjacent region and would 

 leave those appendages motionless. The 

 palpi move; they retain their mobility for a 

 considerable period; the action of the poison, 

 therefore, is evidently situated in the nerves 

 of the fangs. There are two of these nerve- 

 filaments, very fine, very difficult to discover, 

 even by the professional anatomist. The 

 Calicurgus has to reach them one after the 

 other, to moisten them with her poison, pos- 

 sibly to transfix them, in any case to operate 

 upon them in a very restricted manner; so 

 that the diffusion of the virus may not in- 

 volve the adjoining parts. The extreme 

 delicacy of this surgery explains why the 

 weapon remains In the mouth so long; the 

 point of the sting is seeking and eventually 

 finds the tiny fraction of a millimetre where 

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