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172 INSECT ARTIZANS AND THEIR WORK 



perhaps before the summer was over they con- 

 sidered us really a part of home." 



This seems to imply that the Tree Wasps would 

 not have regarded their espionage so complacently ; 

 but, whatever may be the case with American 

 wasps, we can testify that our Vesfa norvegica is 

 quite as tolerant or indifferent as a Ground Wasp. 

 All one summer we had such a nest in our garden 

 and saw it grow from a diameter of two and a half 

 inches to one of over six inches. We were not 

 able to station ourselves by it for a day, but at 

 odd times as occasion offered we would stand for 

 an hour at a time with our face only a few inches 

 from its doorway, and although we were in the 

 line of approach for many wasps, we were never 

 molested. Our attendance was intermittent and 

 spasmodic, so the wasps could not regard us as 

 part of the natural surroundings of their home ; 

 but we were always " calm and unflurried," and 

 were probably regarded as something harmless 

 about which they need not worry. 



But to return to the Peckhams' observation : 

 " The entrance to the Vesfa nest was but an inch 

 across ; and once when they were going in and 

 out in a hurrying throng, jostling each other in 

 their eagerness, we counted the number that passed, 

 one taking the entrances and one the exits. In 

 ten minutes five hundred and ninety-two left the 

 nest, and two hundred and forty-seven went in, 

 so that we saw eight hundred and thirty-nine or 

 about eighty to the minute," 



