LEAF AND TENDRIL 



"that I have overlooked." So I set to work to try 

 to read it; I waited for a sign of life. Presently I 

 saw here and there a bee hovering about over the 

 mounds. It looked like the honey-bee, only less 

 pronounced in color and manner. One of them 

 alighted on one of the mounds near me, and was 

 about to disappear in the hole in the centre when I 

 caught it in my hand. Though it stung me, I re- 

 tained it and looked it over, and in the process was 

 stung several times; but the pain was slight. I saw 

 it was one of our native wild bees, cousin to the 

 leaf-rollers, that build their nests under stones and 

 in decayed fence-rails. (In Packard I found it 

 described under the name of Andrena.) Then I 

 inserted a small weed-stalk into one of the holes, 

 and, with a little trowel I carried, proceeded to 

 dig out the nest. The hole was about a foot deep; 

 at the bottom of it I found a little semi-transparent, 

 membranous sac or cell, a little larger than that of 

 the honey-bee; in this sac was a little pellet of yel- 

 low pollen — a loaf of bread for the young grub 

 when the egg should have hatched. I explored other 

 nests and found them all the same. This discovery 

 was not a great addition to my sum of natural 

 knowledge, but it was something. Now when I see 

 the signs in a field, I know what they mean; they 

 indicate the tiny earthen cradles of Andrena. 



Near by I chanced to spy a large hole in the turf, 

 with no mound of soil about it. I could put the end 

 14 



