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work of the robber, made in entering or leaving the frail struc- 
ture. Some time later the break was repaired. I soon discov- 
ered that if an /caria or a Stenogaster nest were desired it was 
better to collect it immediately rather than to wait a few days at 
the risk of having it mutilated by espa. 
Another note of July 7 reads: “3 p.m. A Vespa hunting 
among some Buri palms chanced upon a nearly completed nest of 
the big mud-dauber (Sceliphron intrudens). The nest was al- 
ready “thick- walled with mud and needed only the more or less 
artistic ribbing for its completion. Our wasp alighted upon it, 
but finding no open cells, set to work biting at the softer recent 
daubings of the proprietress. But the mud beneath was stone- 
like and her efforts were futile. In the meantime Sceliphron 
returned with a ball of mud, but Vespa, with a dash from 
the nest, promptly drove her away. The safe-breaker, stout- 
jawed as she was, chewed vainly for five minutes at the cement- 
like material before she flew off in disgust.” 
I soon came to regard these wasps as a nuisance and destroyed 
them when possible. 
Stenogaster (Ischnogaster). 
This is a genus of exceedingly slender forest wasps typ- 
ical. or Oriental and Australian regions. Although usually 
placed with the Vespinae or social wasps, they have some char- 
acters of the Eumeninae and some of neither subfamily. Those 
that I have observed do not fold their wings longitudinally in 
repose. Some are solitary wasps and others are social, and al- 
though the latter condition may here be somewhat rudimentary, 
the wasps themselves are highly specialized and architects of 
surpassing ability. I have never found the social Stenogaster in 
any but quite small and harmless communities, and have not 
studied these sufficiently to determine if they live as a true 
society. Among the solitary species are S. eximius (Bingham) of 
Ceylon, S. micans (Saussure) var. luzonensis Rohwer of the 
Philippines, and a small unidentified one from the same Islands ; 
of the social ones are S. nigrifrons (Smith) of Burma, S. melleyi 
(Saussure) of Java, and S. depressigaster Rohwer and S. vari- 
pictus Rohwer of the Philippines. It seems doubtful if they 
have three phases 
The nests are very diverse and delicate and fashioned from 
decaying wood, grains of earth, etc. In some cases the cells are 
plastered along one of their sides to a stone or tree trunk; more 
commonly, however, they are suspended as a nest, from a fine 
