372 The Hunting JVasps 



fashion, would leave no successor, since the 

 rearing of the egg would become impossible. 

 Save for the perfection of her surgical powers, 

 the slayer of fat caterpillars would die out in 

 the first generation. 



Again I hear you say : 



* The Hairy Ammophila, before hunting the 

 Grey Worm, may have picked out feebler 

 caterpillars and heaped up several in one cell, 

 until they represented the same bulk of pro- 

 vender as the big prey of to-day. With puny 

 game, a few thrusts of the needle, perhaps one, 

 would be enough. Gradually, large-sized prey 

 came to be preferred, as reducing the number 

 of hunting expeditions. Then, as successive 

 generations went after bigger game, the dagger- 

 strokes were multiplied, in proportion to the 

 victim's power of resistance ; and, by degrees, 

 the elementary instinct of the outset became 

 the highly-developed instinct of our time.' 



To these arguments we may begin by reply- 

 ing that the larva's change of diet and the 

 substitution of one morsel for a number are dia- 

 metrically opposed to what happens before our 

 eyes. The Hunting Wasp, as we know her, is 

 extremely loyal to old customs ; she has sump)- 

 tuary laws which she never transgresses. She 

 who fed on Weevils in her youth puts Weevils 

 and naught else in her larva's cell ; she who was 



