146 NEST OF MASON WASP. [PART II. 



some difficulty, but he at length succeeded in 

 effecting his object. The next day the same man- 

 oeuvre was repeated and another caterpillar gra- 

 dually worked into the hole. As I happened to 

 be leaving the neighbourhood on the following 

 day, and was curious to ascertain how these pri- 

 soners had been stowed away, I carefully stripped 

 off the skirting adjoining the hole, when the 

 secrets of the prison-house were at once revealed. 

 The hole communicated with the bottom of a per- 

 pendicular opening in the wood-work some three 

 inches in length. From the top of this was sus- 

 pended by a slender filament an egg, with and 

 below which was immured a caterpillar still alive, 

 but apparently in a semi-torpid state. These were 

 secured by a flooring of cement, from which was 

 suspended another egg, having for company ano- 

 ther living caterpillar. Then came another floor- 

 ing then another egg and caterpillar then ano- 

 ther flooring, and so on; four cells having been 

 thus completed one above another, each containing 

 its egg, and the caterpillar destined to become 

 food for the young wasp when hatched. The 

 caterpillars were all in the same state of semi- 

 torpidity, these insects having, in common with 

 others, as the Sphex and PompiluSj the marvellous 



