THE ATTAS AT HOME 175 
casional trogon swooping across—a glowing, 
feathered comet of emerald, azurite and gold; 
or, slowly drifting in and out among the vines 
and coming to rest with waving wings, a yellow 
and red spotted Ithomiid,—or was it a Heli- 
coniid or a Danaiid?—with such bewildering 
models and marvelous mimics it was impossible 
to. tell without capture and close examination. 
Giant, purple tarantula-hawks hummed past, 
scanning the leaves for their prey. 
Another class of glade haunters were those 
who came strictly on business,—plasterers and 
Sculptors, who found wet clay ready to their 
needs. Great golden and rufous bees blundered 
down and gouged out bucketsful of mud; while 
slender-bodied, dainty, ebony wasps, after much 
fastidious picking of place, would detach a tiny 
bit of the whitest clay, place it in their snuff- 
box holder, clean their feet and antenne, run 
their rapier in and out and delicately take to 
wing. 
Little black trigonid bees had their special 
quarry, a small deep valley in the midst of a 
waste of interlacing Bad Lands, on the side of a 
precipitous butte. Here they picked and shov- 
eled to their hearts’ content, plastering their 
