CHAP. VI.] 



WASPS. 



257 



Wasps. Of the wasps, one formidable species 

 (Sphex ferruginea of St. Fargeau), which is common to 

 India and most of the eastern islands, is regarded with 

 the utmost dread by the unclad natives, who fly preci- 

 pitately on finding themselves in the vicinity 1 of its 

 nests. These are of such ample dimensions, that when 

 suspended from a branch, they often measure upwards 

 of six feet in length. 2 



Bees. Bees^of several species and genera, some 

 divested of stings, and some in .size scarcely exceeding 

 a house-fly, deposit their honey in hollow trees, or 

 suspend their combs from a branch. The spoils of their 

 industry form one of the chief resources of the uncivi- 

 lised Veddahs, who collect the wax in the upland 



wasp in the Annals and Magazine of 

 Nat. History for May, 1853. 



" I have frequently," he says, " se- 

 lected one of these flies for observa- 

 tion, and have seen their labours ex- 

 tend over a period of a fortnight or 

 twenty days ; sometimes only half a 

 cell was completed in a day, at others 

 as much as two. I never saw more 

 than twenty cells in one nest, seldom 

 indeed that number, and whence the 

 caterpillars were procured was always 

 to me a mystery. I have seen thirty 

 or forty brought in of a species which 

 I knew to be very rare in the perfect 

 state, and which I had sought for in 

 vain, although I knew on what plant 

 they fed. 



" Then again how are they disabled 

 by the wasp, and yet not injured so 

 as to cause their immediate death? 

 Die they all do, at least all that I 

 have ever tried to rear, after taking 

 them from the nest. 



" The perfected fly never effects its 

 egress from the closed aperture, 

 through which the caterpillars were 

 inserted, and when cells are placed 

 end to end, as they are in many in- 

 stances, the outward end of each is 

 always selected. I cannot detect any 

 difference in the thickness in the 

 crust of the cell to cause this uni- 

 formity of practice. It is often as 

 much as half an inch through, of 



VOL. I. 



great hardness, and as far as I can see 

 impervious to air and light. How 

 then does the enclosed fly always 

 select the right end, and with what 

 secretion is it supplied to decompose 

 this mortar ? " 



1 It ought to be remembered in 

 travelling in the forests of Ceylon 

 that sal volatile applied immediately 

 is a specific for the sting of a wasp. 



2 At the January (1839) meeting 

 of the Entomological Society, Mr. 

 Whitehouse exhibited portions of a 

 wasps' nest from Ceylon, between 

 seven and eight feet long and two 

 feet in diameter, and showed that 

 the construction of the cells was per- 

 fectly analogous to those of the hive 

 bee, and that when connected each 

 has a tendency to assume a circular 

 outline. In one specimen where 

 there were three cells united the 

 outer part was circular, whilst the 

 portions common to the three formed 

 straight walls. From this Singhalese 

 nest Mr. Whitehouse demonstrated 

 that the wasps at the commencement 

 of their comb proceed slowly, form- 

 ing the bases of several together, 

 whereby they assume the hexagonal 

 shape, whereas, if constructed sepa- 

 rately, he thought each single cell 

 woidd be circular. See Proc. Ent. 

 Soc. vol. iii. p. xvi. 



