i8o ANTS, BEES AND WASPS 



and stored, is closed with a lid composed of three or four circular 

 pieces of leaf which exactly fit the open end ; and five to seven 

 cells are usually placed in a row, the rounded end of one fitting 

 into the top of another. The leaves of the hornbeam, privet, 

 and poplar are used by other species of Megachile in the formation 

 of their cells. 



The habits of the Social Wasps, Vespida, resemble those of 

 the bumble bees in many ways. Each colony contains a queen 

 or perfect female, a quantity of workers or imperfect females, 

 and a certain number of males or drones. Each colony is founded 

 by a queen wasp which has passed the winter in a state of hiber- 

 nation. She builds a few cells in a suitable hole in the ground, 

 or in a bank ; in each of these she deposits an egg, and when the 

 larvae hatch she supplies them with food. She continues to build 

 cells, lay eggs, and attend to the young alone, until the first batch 

 of workers arrive to help her. 



Wasps' nests are beautifully regular structures. The cells are 

 hexagonal in form, and are placed side by side to form combs. 

 In each comb is only a single row of cells, which open downwards. 

 The first comb, made by the queen wasp, is suspended from the 

 roof of the hollow in which the nest is situated, and each succeed- 

 ing comb is attached to the one above it by three or four short 

 pillars. The material used for making the combs is a kind of 

 paper, or cardboard, made from wood-pulp, and manufactured 

 by the wasps from fibres of dry wood, which they scrape from 

 an old stump or paling, and chew until they are reduced to a 

 pulpy mass. The whole of the nest is enveloped in a thick paper 

 covering which is enlarged from time to time as fresh combs are 

 added. 



There is, however, a good deal of variety in the nests made 

 by different species of wasps. Some are very solidly constructed, 

 others made of the most delicate paper; some are composed of 

 tier upon tier of combs, others consist of a single comb only. They 

 vary in size, too, from the tiny nests no bigger than a small apple 

 made by certain species, to huge nests measuring several feet 

 or even yards in length, constructed by wasps found in China 

 and India. Many species of wasp build in a hollow tree, while 

 others suspend their paper structures from the branches of trees 

 or even under the eaves of houses. The Hornet, Vespa crabro, is 



