PROVISION FOR REARING THE YOUNG. 11/ 



flowers, to some extent for themselves, but especially 

 in order that their young may at the moment of 

 appearance possess a food which will enable them 

 to undergo their first metamorphosis sheltered from 

 the inclemencies outside. These foods are enclosed 

 with great art, according to the species, either in 

 skilfully-constructed cells of wax, as by Bees, or in 

 nests of paper or cardboard which the Wasps fabricate, 

 or again in huts built of earth in the manner of the 

 Chalicodoma. 



Species which obtain for their larvce foods manu- 

 factured by others. — Other insects have not this taste 

 for lengthy labours, and do not know how to execute 

 them ; but they do not intend that their young shall 

 be the victims of maternal lack of skill, and they 

 display marvellous resources to enable them to profit 

 by the foresight of others. 



The Sitaris muralis, a beetle whose customs 

 have been described by Fabre in a remarkable 

 manner,^ may be counted among the cleverest in 

 assuring to its larvae the goods of others. It puts 

 them in a position to profit by it, and when they are 

 installed they know sufficiently well what to do. 

 The species has so long perpetuated itself by this pro- 

 cess that it has become, both in mother and offspring, 

 highly automatic. It is a hymenopterous insect which 

 this family, whose first vital manifestation is theft, 

 thus levies a contribution on. It is called the Antho- 

 phora pilifera, and during the fine weather it makes a 

 collection of honey intended to be absorbed by its 



1 " Hypermelamorphoses et Moeurs des Melo'ides," .4k«. Sc. Nat., 

 iv. S^rie, t. 7, 1857, p. 299; also " Nouvelles observations sur 

 rhypermetamorphose et les Moeurs des Meloides," ibid., t. 9, 1858, 

 p. 265. 



