86 INSECT ARTIZANS AND THEIR WORK 



Coelonites ahbreviatus constructs tubular earthen 

 cells, which are attached in small groups to the dry 

 stems of plants, with the mouths downwards. 

 They are provisioned hj the mother wasp with a 

 paste said to resemble dried honey — probably a 

 mixture of honey and pollen. 



One of these Mason Wasps (Jbispa) that is 

 peculiar to Australia is much like a large Odynerus. 

 Its beautifully constructed nest is so large that it 

 might be thought to be the combined effort of a 

 colony of Social Wasps, but it is entirely the work 

 of one female. The entrance to it takes the form 

 of a projecting funnel. 



The East Indian Rhygchium nitidulum makes 

 clay pots, like Eumenes, and stores them with cater- 

 pillars. The pots are attached to wood. Of an 

 allied species — R. brunneum — Sir Richard Owen 

 complained that it obliterates Egyptian hiero- 

 glyphics by plastering its mud cells among them. 

 Some thousands of years ago, when an ancient 

 Egyptian was being converted into a mummy, one 

 of these wasps had the fortune to be wrapped 

 up with him. When, in later times, Dr. Birch, 

 of the British Museum, unrolled the wrappings of 

 that mummy the wasp came to light, to prove 

 that Rhygchium brunneum was an ancient Egyptian 

 also. 



The most important of the insect masons we 

 have reserved to the last — the Termites or " white 

 ants." It is probably unnecessary, at this date, to 

 explain that these insects are not ants at all, and 



