354 HOMES WITHOUT HANDS. 



The lower insect is the pretty Pelopcem fidularis, with its 

 yellow and black banded body. Both the insects, as well as 

 their houses, are represented of the natural size. 



The cell of the Pelopaeus is larger than that of the preceding 

 insect, and occupies much more time in the construction, a week 

 at least being devoted to the task. She sets to work very 

 methodically, taking a long time in kneading the clay, which 

 she rolls into little spherical pellets, and kneads for a minute or 

 two before she leaves the ground. She then flies away with her 

 load, and adds it to the nest, spreading the clay in a series of 

 rings, like the courses of bricks in a circular chimney, so that 

 the edifice soon assumes a rudely cylindrical form. 



When she has nearly completed her task, she goes off in 

 search of creatures wherewith to stock the nest, and to serve as 

 food- for the young, and selects about the most unpromising 

 specimens that can be conceived. Like many other solitary 

 hymenoptera, this Pelopaeus stores her nest with spiders, and 

 any one would suppose that she would choose the softest and the 

 plumpest kinds for her yoimg. It is found, however, that she 

 acts precisely in the opposite manner. 



In tropical America there is a large group of spiders allied to 

 the common garden spider, but of the most extraordinary shapes 

 and colours. They all possess a hard, shelly covering, polished 

 and shining like that of many beetles, and glittering with bright 

 and radiant hues — ^blue, crimson, green, and purple being the 

 colours with which they are ordinarily decorated. Their forms 

 are, however, even more remarkable than their colours. The 

 hard and shelly covering is not uniform and smooth, but shoots 

 out into the most extraordinary projections, giving to the 

 creatures a wild and fantastic grotesqueness of aspect, that sur- 

 passes even the weird imaginings of Breughel, Cranagh, Callot, 

 and other masters of diablerie in art. 



One genus has the abdomen formed in a drum shape, the 

 sides and extremity being covered with short, sharp, and stout 

 spines. Another has the abdomen modified into a ball-like 

 shape, from which radiate sharp spikes, like those of the well- 

 known "calthrop;" while in another genus certain enormous 

 projections issue from the abdomen, two being so large that in 

 volume they exceed the whole of the abdomen and body. In 

 one species they are tliick, solid, and pal mated, like the horns of 



