84 The Hunting IVasps 



a tool, on which the future of the grubs depends. 

 It must therefore be one easy to wield in the 

 struggle with the captured prey ; it must be 

 capable of being inserted in the flesh and with- 

 drawn without the least hesitation, a condition 

 much better fulfilled by a smooth than by a 

 barbed blade. 



I wished to find out at my own expense if 

 the Sphex' sting is very painful, this sting which 

 lays low sturdy victims with terrible rapidity. 

 Well, I confess with profound admiration that 

 it is insignificant and bears no comparison, for 

 intensity of pain, with the stings of the irascible 

 Bees and Social Wasps. It hurts so little that, 

 instead of using the forceps, I would not scruple 

 to take in my fingers any live Sphex-wasps that 

 I needed in my experiments. I can say the 

 same of the different Cerceres, of the Philanthi,^ 

 of the Palari, of even the huge Scolise,^ whose 

 very view inspires dismay, and, generally speak- 

 ing, of all the Hunting Wasps that I have been 

 able to observe. I make an exception of the 

 Spider - huntresses, the Pompili ; ^ and even 



1 For Phila7ithus Apivorus, the Bee-eating Wasp, cf. Social 

 Life in the Insect World, by J. H. Fabre, translated by Bernard 

 Miall : chap. xiii. — Translator's Note. 



2 Cf. The Life and Love of the hncct : chap. xi. — Translator's 

 Note. 



^ Cf. The Life and Love of the Insect : chap. xii. — Tt'anslaior's 

 Note. 



