EXPERIMENTAL INQUIRIES. 265 
re-establish itself without her, as it best might, the 
new brood has, to my experience, uniformly consisted 
of drones. The wasps which build the secondary 
nest, and deposit in the new cells the eggs which 
develop into drone brood, are nothing more than the 
common workers of the original nest, whose ovaries 
have been stimulated into activity by the removal of 
the queen. Whenthe swarm is numerous, we cannot 
of course observe each individual accurately, and 
feel sure that such and such only have been engaged 
inthe work.- But the case is different when the 
swarm has been so weakened that we can count, we 
can mark if we like, every one of the labourers. 
The structure may, indeed, under such circumstances 
hardly deserve the name of a nest; but the wasps 
are all the more open to observation on this account. 
Three such abortive nests were watched very care- 
fully, while they were bemg built and the wasps 
were employed about them; and it appeared certain 
that they were made and inhabited only by ordinary 
workers. For no other wasps were ever seen about, 
and no others were found in them when they were 
taken at last. 
The interior of two of these nests displayed a few 
cells with eggs, while the third, the most deserving 
of the name of a nest, contained diminutive larvee. 
These larvee, however, though they were left un- 
disturbed for a month in the place which the wasps 
had chosen for themselves, durmg the most favourable 
weather, and with their own nurse tenders to look 
after them, still remamed diminutive larve, never 
even reaching the pupal stage. None of the pas- 
sengers whirled along the railway knew what a 
