TiiK FikST Pai'KK-Makkk 151 



feet and imperfect — queens or workers — but not 

 by those defenceless creatures, the males. Tlie 

 nature of tlie stin^ (so far as it is not already well 

 known to most of us by pungent experience) I 

 will enter into later ; it must suffice for the pre- 

 sent to say that it is in essence an instrument for 

 depositing the ei4}4s, and that it is oidy incidentally 

 turned into a weapon of offence or defence, and 

 a means of stunning or paralysing the prey or 

 food-insects. 



The first tiling to understand about a conununity 

 of wasps i>. the way it originates. The story is a 

 strange one. When the lirst frosts ^ct in, almost 

 all the wasps in temperate countries die olf to 

 a worker from the etfects of cold. The chill 

 winds nip them. Kor a few days in autuum you 

 may often notice the last stia^j^liu^ suryiyors 

 crawling feebly about, yery uncomfortable and 

 nund") from the cold, and with their temper some- 

 what soured by the consciousness of their own 

 e.\ceedin_<f weakness. in this in itable condition, 

 feelin<4 their latter end draw nij^h, they are j^ivinj^ 

 to usinj4 their stints with waspisii yirulence on the 

 smallest proyocation ; they moye about half-dazed 

 on the damp ground, or lie torpid in their nests 

 till death oyertakes them. Of the whole populous 

 city which luunmed with life and business but a 

 few weeks earlier, no more than two oi" three 

 suryiyors at the outside struj^j^le somehow throui^h 

 the winter, to carry on the race of wasps to suc- 

 ceedinj^ generations. The colder the season, tlie 

 fewer the stragglers who liye it out ; in open 



