100 BUILDING AND BURROWING WASPS 



killed, and then the egg is laid in their bodies, so that on being 

 hatched the grub finds itself in the midst of food. 



Another species of these solitary wasps is a much larger 

 insect, about two inches hi length, and she makes nests, which 

 are extremely hard, and are like half-buried native water-pots, 

 with the mouths facing the observer, and arranged regularly 

 one above the other. When finished they are plastered over 

 with rough gravel. Unlike the wasp previously mentioned, 

 this one does not fetch the clay for building purposes from the 

 banks of a stream, but carries the water to the dry earth, which 

 it then damps and kneads into balls. The cells are stocked 

 with caterpillars, which are stung and numbed in the same way 

 as the spiders are treated by the first-named wasp. There are 

 usually three caterpillars placed in each cell. 



Another wasp, also very common, does not build cells, but 

 digs a burrow in the ground, even in pretty hard places, like a 

 well-trodden road. Some of these use caterpillars for stocking 

 their burrows, some large spiders, and some crickets, but all 

 drag or carry their prey on foot, even the largest of them. One 

 small wasp, when carrying a spider, first amputates all its legs 

 and then slings the body beneath her. The burrows of the 

 larger wasp are deep in comparison with the size of the insect, 

 being frequently a foot or more in depth. Mr Cory gives a 

 graphic description of a battle between one of these wasps and a 

 large spider, hi which, however, the former managed to sting its 

 prey and capture it. 



There is one very small wasp that makes no cell or burrow, 

 but chooses a long hole in a piece of wood, or a small bamboo, 

 etc., for the rearing of its larvae. " Each kind of wasp seems 

 to have its own peculiar way of hunting ; some run down on 

 foot by scent for long distances ; some dash down violently 

 into the web of a spider, and catch him as he drops from out of 

 it ; while others again seize their prey upon the wing, especially 

 the social wasps. The males of all are lazy and do no work." 2 



January is usually the wettest month of the year hi Imerina ; 

 and in some years there occurs what the Hova call the hafitoana, 

 or " seven days " that is, of almost continuous rain, although 

 it more usually lasts only three or four days. Such a time is 

 most disastrous for houses, compounds and boundary walls, 

 for the continuous rain soaks into them and brings them down 



