54 



HABITS OF WASPS. 





Fig. 50. VESPIARY OR WASP'S NEST. 



death and thrown out of the cells by the neuters, who, as well 

 as the males, perish when cold weather arrives ; so that the pre- 

 servation of the species is confided exclusively to the few females 

 who resist the inclemency, of winter and survive till spring. 



" Cruel and ferocious as these insects may appear, still their affection for 

 their habitation and young is very striking. Whatever injury may be done 

 to the nest, if it should be even broken to pieces, they will linger about the 

 cherished spot, or quit it only to follow the combs wherever they may be 

 transferred. ' Those,' says Reaumur, ' which were absent when I removed 

 the nest, finding, on their return, neither companions nor home, knew not 

 where to go, and for days together hovered around the hole before they 

 determined to abandon the spot.' The material from which the nest is con- 

 structed is vegetable fibre. The wasp will not use saw-dust ; but, knowing 

 that a filamentous material, like linen rags, is necessary for the fabrication, 

 of its paper, it amasses pieces of some substance possessing this quality. 

 As the first step in the process of paper-making is to soak the vegetable 

 fibre in water, so the wasp takes especial care to select the filaments which 

 it intends to use from wet wood which has rotted hi the rain. These are 

 worked up with a glutinous secretion, and thus the material is prepared. 

 When the wasp can get its paper ready made, it makes no scruple to appro- 

 priate it. Reaumur, being once disturbed by a noise in his study, found 

 that it arose from the gnawing of a piece of paper which these insects had 





