WASPS, 197 



cept in the beginning of spring, and in the months of Sep- 

 tember and October. During the summer, they are totally 

 occupied in laying their eggs and feeding their young. In 

 this last operation, they are assisted by the other wasps ; for 

 the females alone, though numerous, would be insufficient for 

 the laborious task. A wasp's nest, when completed, some- 

 times consists of sixteen thousand cells, each of which contains 

 an egg, a worm, or a nymph. The eggs are white, trans- 

 parent, of an oblong figure, and differ in size, according to 

 the kind of wasps which are to proceed from them. Some of 

 them are no larger than the head of a small pin. They are 

 so firmly glued to the bottoms of the cells, that it is with dif- 

 ficulty they can be detached without breaking. Eight days 

 after the eggs are deposited in the cells, the worms are hatched, 

 and are considerably larger than the eggs which gave birth 

 to them. These worms demand the principal cares of the 

 wasps who continue always in the nest. They feed them, as 

 birds feed their young, by giving them, from time to time, a 

 mouthful of food. It is astonishing to see with what industry 

 and rapidity a female runs along the cells of a comb, and 

 distributes to each worm a portion of nutriment. In propor- 

 tion to the ages and conditions of the worms, they are fed 

 with solid food, such as the bellies of insects, or with a liquid 

 substance disgorged by the mother. When a worm is so 

 large as to occupy its whole cell, it is then ready to be meta- 

 morphosed into a nymph. It then refuses all nourishment, 

 and ceases to have any connection with the wasps in the nest. 

 It shuts up the mouth of its cell with a fine silken cover, in 

 the same manner as the silkworm and other caterpillars spin 

 their cods. This operation is completed in three or four 

 hours, and the animal remains in the nymph state nine or ten 

 days, when, with its teeth, it destroys the external cover of 

 the cell, and comes forth in the form of a winged insect, 

 which is either male, female or neuter, according to the na- 

 ture of the egg from which it was hatched. In a short time, 

 the wasps newly transformed receive the food brought into 

 the nest by the foragers in the fields. What is still more 

 curious, in the course of the first day after their transforma- 

 tion, the young wasps have been observed going to the fields, 

 bringing in provisions, and distributing them to the worms in 

 the cells. A cell is no sooner abandoned by a young wasp, 

 than it is cleaned, trimmed, and repaired by an old one, and 

 rendered, in every respect, proper for the reception of an- 

 other egg. 



17* 



