7450 Insects. 



and males different means must be employed, and some degree of wariness and caution 

 observed, since tbe former, though possessini; ample means of defence, and although 

 in the spring they will upon occasion fight desperately with eucli other, will nevertheless 

 at other limes be observed to decline engaging in a contest in which they might chance 

 to get the worst of it ; having a constant eye to self-preservation they act as though 

 fully agreeing with Sir John Falstaff, that " the better part of valour is— discretion,'' 

 while the latter, being totally unprovided wiih the means of defence, seem to be aware 

 that their only chance of safety lies in avoiding danger in whatever shape it may present 

 itself; they therefore never voluntarily expose themselves to it, but may be observed 

 upon all occasions to retreat therefrom with as much agility as — from their somewhat 

 sluggish nature — they are capable of exercising. The capture of these individuals had 

 the immediate effect of putting a complete stop to the work of the nest, and of breaking 

 up the community. A few solitary workers were to be seen hanging listlessly about 

 for a day or two, with here and there a young queen, after which they ail disappeared. 

 On removing a portion of the covering, for the purpose of observing the state of the 

 combs, I was surprised to find that the old queen — the foundress of the colony — was 

 still in the nest, and that with the exception of larvae, &c., she was the sole occupant, 

 the worn appearance of her body, the pubescence with which it was once adorned 

 having been completely rubbed off, together with the tattered state of her wings — too 

 tattered to be of further use to her — were marks sufficient to prevent any mistake being 

 made in her identity. Although so late in the season, she was found, on being opened 

 after death produced by chloroform, to contain a considerable number of eggs : this 

 was probably owing to the late period in the summer at which she began to lay, since, 

 as stated in my former paper, only about twenty young hornets had made their appear- 

 ance at the beginning of August. The nest contained five combs on its completion, 

 or rather when the woik of enlarging it had ceased, for nests formed by the social Ves- 

 pidffi are, in point of fact, never completed. The building is invariably in a progressive 

 state till the strength of the workers fails and they drop off in the midst of their work, 

 leaving numbers of incomplete cells and unfinished portions of the covering in which 

 the combs are enclosed. The upper comb consisted entirely of the cells of workers, 

 the second of males, and the third, fourth and fifth of females. All the cells, both of 

 workers and males, were empty ; not a single egg, larva or pupa being found in 

 either of them. The female cells contained about a dozen eggs and near two hundred 

 larvae, one of which, and only one, had spun itself up. The remaining cells were empty, 

 the larvae they once contained having passed into the perfect state, except a few 

 which had fallen out or had been dragged out by the workers. None of the cells 

 contained more than one egg crone larva each, and none of the workers whose 

 bodies were examined were found to contain eggs, which two circumstances 

 combined rather lead to the inference, though they are by no means sufficient to prove, 

 that among the social Vespidse it is only in nests that have been deprived of the queen 

 we find cells crowded with eggs or larvae, and that wherever such is observed to be the 

 case those eggs and larva; are the produce of workers, who, but for the occurrence of 

 the casualty just alluded to, would have remained infertile. The covering with which 

 the insects contented themselves during the greater part of the season was basin-shaped, 

 and thin in substance, but as the weather became more severe it was gradually made 

 thicker, and the opening as gradually contracted, so that it appeared to be the ultimate 

 design of the woikers to close it up so far as only to leave, like the other species of 

 social Vespida-, an aperture sufficiently large for the purpose of entrance and exit. 



