186 THE LEAF-CUTTER BEE 



they were. They were the work of the rose-leaf-cutter 

 bee. Each cylinder was built up of circular patches of 

 rose-leaf, neatly fitted over each other in two or three 

 layers, and apparently fastened with some adhesive 

 substance. They were closed at one end and fitted 

 with a hinged lid at the other ; and each contained a 

 fat white grub, which, having consumed the store of 

 pollen provided for it by the mother bee, was about to 

 turn into a pupa for six months' sleep, until the sun 

 of next summer should cause its resurrection, bring 

 it forth as a perfect replica of its race, and, at the same 

 time, provide fresh young rose-leaves whereon to exercise 

 its hereditary craft. The fidelity and industry with 

 which these insects repeat year by year and century 

 after century the complicated functions of their kind is 

 truly pathetic, seeing that no mother, after depositing 

 her egg in the green cradle and piling beside it a store 

 of pollen for the prospective infant which she shall 

 never see, flits about aimlessly for a few weeks in the 

 autumn sunshine, till she turns drowsy in the chill 

 of approaching winter, and falls asleep, never to wake 

 again. 



I have never noticed the rose-leaf-cutter use any other 

 building material than rose-leaves ; but there are leaf- 

 cutting bees in most parts of the world, and each 

 species confines its operations to one, two, or three 

 particular kinds of plant. Reaumur described the habits 

 of a leaf-cutter of the genus Osmia, closely akin to 

 Megachile, which he named I'abeille tapissiere (the 

 tapestry bee) because it lined its nest with the scarlet 

 petals of the corn-poppy. 



