THE MASON BEES 131 



the sun sank low beyond the mountains and 

 the last rays of the evening lights tinted with 

 their afterglow the desert plain and its border- 

 ing hills. 



Weary with the arduous labors of the day 

 those bees whose domiciles were not yet com- 

 plete, corked the entrances to their burrows 

 with their own bodies, placing them in upside 

 down position with only the tip of their abdo- 

 mens protruding. Thus did they guard their 

 honey treasures from the night marauders and 

 noxious parasites. 



As soon as the sunshine of the morning came 

 to warm up their chilled and stiffened bodies, 

 they were again at work. Those who had com- 

 pleted their cells the night before were now 

 fashioning new ones, and those who had incom- 

 plete burrows were busy putting on the finish- 

 ing touches. Each bee lays from eight to ten 

 eggs, and for every egg a cell was made and pro- 

 visioned with the honey paste. 



After the third day the burrows were all 

 complete and the adamantine ground looked 

 almost as it had before. The bees had aban- 

 doned the scene of their labors and doubtless 



