62 OUR HOUSEHOLD INSECTS 



his opinion that they are much less fickle and more 

 reliable than bees an opinion, however, which will 

 probably not be generally endorsed. 



They will rarely attack unless provoked, and, though 

 it is not easy to maintain a philosophic composure and 

 indifference when a wasp is buzzing round one's head, 

 yet such would no doubt be the best policy ; at any rate, 

 the violent nourishes and dashes so often made against 

 them with handkerchiefs, knives, or what not, are more 

 likely to irritate than to drive away insects so renowned 

 for valour. Of course, when we attack their citadel, 

 they will at once assume the offensive (as who would 

 not ?) and fight to the death for house and home. Yery 

 hot or windy weather, too, seems to bring out whatever 

 spitefulness they possess ; but this also is a psychological 

 experience not altogether foreign even to Homo sapiens 

 himself ! ' . 



In distinguishing wasps from other Hymenoptera no 

 reliance must be placed on the mere presence of yellow 

 bands on the body, for though all wasps, of whatever 

 habit, have these, such a style of ornamentation is by 

 no means confined to them, but is of frequent occurrence 

 throughout the whole order. But there is a certain 

 peculiarity of the wings that will at once separate a 

 wasp from the crowds of other yellow-banded insects. 

 All wasps have four wings, and this will serve to dis- 

 tinguish them from certain two-winged flies of the 

 order Diptera, with which they are sometimes con- 

 founded, but will not distinguish them from other 

 Hymenoptera, as four is the natural number of wings 

 in this group. But the anterior wings are folded longi- 

 tudinally in repose, i.e., when a wasp closes its wings 

 it does not merely lay them along its back, as a bee 

 would do, but also folds each fore- wing along a line 



