Vol. XXX I ENTOMOLOGICAL NEWS. 55 



habits of the wasps that build tlieir nests in burrows. How they go 

 about this, how they provide food for their young, how they find their 

 well-concealed nest again, are all described in the most interesting 

 manner. Marvelous instances of place memory, displays of instinct, 

 are mentioned, also ingenious experiments are made on the homing of 

 the common paper-nest wasp. The book is the result of four years' 

 out-of-door study, generally within a radius of thirty miles of St. Louis, 

 of these wasps "in their natural haunts while pursuing their occupations 

 in their own ways." One of the most interesting chapters is that on 

 "Some Bembicine Wasps," in which are described the nesting and social 

 habits of the western burrow^ing wasp, Bemhix nuhUipennis. The pe- 

 culiar nuptial or sun dance is vividly pictured in words. A colony of 

 these wasps nested year after year in a bald and bare space in a field 

 which the boys of the neighborhood kept packed hard in pursuit of 

 their weekly baseball game. Even though suddenly interrupted in 

 their sun dance or nest building, the wasps returned at the first oppor- 

 tunity. How the mother attends the nest and her young until its 

 maturity, and other minute details in the habits of this wasp are men- 

 tioned, showing close and patient ol)servation. The chapter on pom- 

 piUd wasps, especially as regards Pompiloides tropicus, is scarcely 

 less interesting. Here are described the peculiar methods of carrying 

 the prey, erratic actions during excavation of the burrows, and the 

 constant guard against parasites. The patience of the observers is 

 somewhat realized when reading this chapter, especially that part 

 relating to the tantalizing actions of Priocnemis pompilius. Other 

 chapters describing the habits of some fly-catching wasps, bee-killing 

 wasps, the muddaubers which build their mud nests in the gables and 

 on the rafters of our buildings, wood-boring wasps, the sand-loving 

 ammophila, and the mining eumenid wasps, are all of absorbing inter- 

 est. The nesting habits of the hunters of Orthoptera in the genera 

 Alyson, Tachysphex, and particularly Friononyx atratum and thomae, 

 are minutely described. Here is told how the cow-bird wasp. Stilus 

 unicinctus, watches thomae make and supply her nest and, when it is 

 sealed and camouflaged, burrows down, destroys thomac's egg and lays 

 her own. In the last chapter, on general considerations, the authors 

 comment on the evidences deduced from their observations. They state 

 that "the data secured give evidence of four very definite attitudes 

 [types?] of behavior: i. That there are very definite and iron-clad 

 instincts. 2. That, despite these instincts, which are constant in each 

 species, there is much variation in the behavior of the individuals. 

 3. That there is a display of the expression of emotions in these crea- 

 tures. 4. That, in many instances, there is much aptitude for learning, 

 display of memory, profiting by experience and what seems to us ra- 

 tional conduct." — E. T. Cresson, Jr. 



