The Hunting Wasps 



her burrow; and she now goes off. Where 

 to? Who can tell? Perhaps to the flowers 

 not far away, where, by the last gleams of 

 daylight, she will sip a drop of sugary liquid 

 at the bottom of the cups, even as our miners, 

 after toiling in their dark galleries, fly for 

 comfort to the bottle in the evening. She 

 goes off, to a less or greater distance, stopping 

 at this bin and that in the flowers' cellar. 

 The evening, the night, the morning slip by. 

 Still, she must return to the burrow and com- 

 plete her task, she must return after the 

 marches and countermarches of the morning 

 hunt and the bewildering flight from flower 

 to flower during the libations of the evening 

 before. That the Social Wasp should re- 

 turn to her nest and the Social Bee to her 

 hive does not surprise me at all: the hive 

 and the nest are permanent residences, the 

 way to which becomes known by long practice ; 

 but the Ammophila has no acquaintance with 

 the locality which could help her to return 

 to her burrow after such a long absence. 

 Her tunnel is at a spot which she perhaps vis- 

 ited yesterday for the first time and which 

 she must find again to-morrow, when she is 

 quite out of her bearings and moreover ham- 

 pered with a heavy load of game. Never- 

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