The Langtiedocian Sphex 137 



Let us take no notice of the repeated trips, 

 the fruitless searches, the tedium of frequent 

 long waiting, but rather present the Sphex 

 suddenly to the reader as she herself appears 

 to the observer. Here she is, at the bottom of 

 a sunken road with high, sandy banks. She 

 comes on foot, but gets help from her wings in 

 dragging her heavy prize. The Ephippiger's 

 antennae, long and slender as threads, are the 

 harnessing-ropes. Holding her head high, she 

 grasps one of them in her mandibles. The 

 antenna gripped passes between her legs ; and 

 the game follows, turned over on its back. 

 Should the soil be too uneven and so offer 

 resistance to this method of carting, the Wasp 

 clasps her unwieldy burden and carries it with 

 very short flights, interspersed, as often as 

 possible, with journeys on foot. We never see 

 her undertake a sustained flight, for long dis- 

 tances, holding the game in her legs, as is the 

 practice of those expert aviators, the Bembeces 

 and Cerceres, for instance, who bear through 

 the air for more than half a mile their respective 

 Flies or Weevils, a very light booty compared 

 with the huge Ephippiger. The overpowering 

 weight of her capture compels the Languedocian 

 Sphex to make the whole, or nearly the whole, 

 journey on foot, her method of transport being 

 consequently slow and laborious. 



