IV 
SOCIAL LIFE OF WASPS 
URELY in the jetsam of the autumn’s ebb- 
tide there is no more eloquent item than that 
wasps’ nest in the gooseberry bush—empty since 
the morning frosts of early September. Most 
people hail “the last of the wasps” with consider- 
able satisfaction, and even their champions must 
admit that there are limits to their relevancy; 
yet we never see their autumnal dying-off with- 
out giving them our admiration. Laying aside a 
colossally absurd prejudice, who can fail to ap- 
preciate the workmanship of that familiar hanging 
edifice, often as big as one’s head, an elegant house 
of paper, fabricated from salivated shavings planed 
from fences and disbarked branches? There we 
see story hung from story, with perfect economy 
of space and security of ventilation; a compacted 
framework of hundreds of cradles rivaling the 
honeycomb of hive-bees; and outside it all a series 
of rainproof and windproof envelopes. 
Some biologists have said that animals use matter 
constructively inside their bodies, whereas man 
brings matter into his service extra-corporeally. 
This is going much too far, however, for there are 
many of the more adventurous animal types—but 
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