How Animals Work. 



ing antennae, tested by eager jaws, until a suitable place 

 is found. Then she at once begins to gnaw vigorously 

 at the woody fibres, working excitedly with might and 

 main until a little bundle has been separated, and the 

 fragments of fibre have been gnawed and worked up 

 into a kind of wood pulp. Grasping this precious 

 burden with her jaws and front legs, she flies back, 

 and disappears within the hole in the hedge bank. 



Within the excavation in the hedge bank, she now 

 clings to the roof with her second and third pairs of 

 legs, while with the first pair, and the aid of her powerful 

 jaws, she attaches the wood pulp she has brought with 

 her to the ceiling of the chamber. There are now swift, 

 repeated visits to the old weathered palings for fresh 

 supplies of wood pulp, which are in turn worked up 

 and attached to the first piece fixed to the roof of the 

 chamber, until at last a small pendent pillar of wood 

 pulp is formed. The Queen Wasp now proceeds to 

 form three very shallow, cup-shaped cells at the end 

 of the pillar, and, after depositing an egg in each, con- 

 structs a protecting wood-pulp roof over them. More 

 cells are continually added, eggs deposited therein, and 

 the wood-pulp roof extended over them. 



In a short time the eggs that were deposited in the 

 first three cells have hatched, and tiny hungry grubs have 

 emerged. The little grubs, or larvae, grow rapidly, and 

 as they increase in size so the Queen Wasp adds more 

 material to increase the depth of the cells, that the 

 larvae shall not fall out although suspended head down- 

 wards. The busy parent is now toiling all day long, 

 enlarging the chamber by excavating the earth from 

 the roof, sides, and floor, then going forth to seek further 



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