The Hunting Wasps 



short, the pen have not described imaginary 

 marvels. No scientific conclusion is firmly 

 established until it has received confirmation 

 by means of practical tests, carried out in 

 every variety of way. We will therefore 

 subject to experimental proof the physiolo- 

 gical operation of which the Great Cerceris 

 has just apprised us. If it be possible to 

 obtain artificially what the Wasp obtains with 

 her sting, namely, the abolition of movement 

 and the continued preservation of the patient 

 in a perfectly fresh condition; if it be possible 

 to work this wonder with the Beetles hunted 

 by the Cerceris, or with those presenting a 

 similar nervous centralization, while we are 

 unsuccessful with Beetles whose ganglia are 

 far apart, then we shall be bound to admit, 

 however hard to please we may be in the 

 matter of tests, that in the unconscious in- 

 spiration of her instinct the Wasp has all the 

 resources of consummate art. Let us see 

 what experiment has to tell us. 



The operating-method is of the simplest. 

 It is a question of taking a needle, or, better 

 and more convenient, the point of a fine steel 

 nib and introducing a tiny drop of some cor- 

 rosive fluid into the thoracic motor centres, 

 by pricking the insect slightly at the junction 

 54 



