The Banded Epeira 



Not at all: the bag is woven around noth- 

 ing, as accurate in shape, as finished in struc- 

 ture as under normal conditions. The absurd 

 perseverance displayed by certain Bees, 

 whose egg and provisions I used to remove, 1 

 is here repeated without the slightest interfer- 

 ence from me. My victims used scrupulously 

 to seal up their empty cells. In the same 

 way, the Epeira puts the eiderdown quilting 

 and the taffeta wrapper round a capsule that 

 contains nothing. 



Another, distracted from her work by 

 some startling vibration, leaves her nest at the 

 moment when the layer of red-brown wad- 

 ding is being completed. She flees to the 

 dome, at a few inches above her unfinished 

 work, and spends upon a shapeless mattress, 

 of no use whatever, all the silk with which 

 she would have woven the outer wrapper if 

 nothing had come to disturb her. 



Poor fool! You upholster the wires of 

 your cage with swan's-down and you leave 

 the eggs imperfectly protected. The absence 

 of the work already executed and the hard- 

 ness of the metal do not warn you that you 



1 These experiments are described in the author's es- 

 say on the Mason Bees entitled Fragments on Insect 

 Psychology. Translator's Note. 



99 



