or THE WASP. 91 



in the summer, when I took it on the 8th of October, there were only 

 fifty- eight labourers in it, and at this period they are very lean, there- 

 fore unfit for living - through the winter. 



About this period I suppose the males and young females copulate, 

 and when this is over, that the males all die ; and what makes this still 

 more probable is that they are at this season very lean, similar to the 

 labourers. I also conceive that the old queen dies in the autumn, but 

 at what time I do not know. The young queens about this time become 

 very indolent, and woidd appear to be weak, although it cannot be 

 supposed they are so, being now extremely fat. Their oviducts are 

 pretty large, and have small ova in them, which is not the case with 

 the workers. 



Of their Winter Retreat. — By the latter end of October the hive is 

 deserted, by the workers first, then by the males, and lastly by the 

 young queens. The two first I sivppose die ; but what becomes of the 

 queens I believe has not been commonly known : they hide themselves 

 in winter in holes in dry banks. 



Many things are discovered when in pursuit of something else, more 

 especially if it is a subject we may at the time be engaged in. It was 

 one of the orders I had given to my gardener, that, when he was digging 

 in the winter, he would be attentive to what he dug, and see if he ever 

 dug up a wasp, hornet, or humble-bee. In digging a dry bank about 

 the beginning of April, he dug up three wasps alive ; they were in holes 

 like worm-holes, not a great way from the surface. They were coiled 

 up like a wood-louse. He brought one into the hot-house, and it 

 became lively. 



Mr. Fergusson told me that Lord Auckland's 1 gardener told him that 

 he turned up a live wasp among some leaves of trees in the month of 

 December. They sometimes come abroad in fine weather in the winter : 

 my gardener saw a wasp of the large kind in March, but could not 

 catch it. The weather being fine, one was caught in the month of 

 April, which was a female, which had eggs in the ovaria, but not 

 farther advanced than those in the month of October. To see if I could 

 keep wasps through the winter, I closed up the hole or door of a wasp's 

 nest about the beginning of November to confine them in ; biit they 

 set to, and made a passage out. However, I was at last able to confine 

 them ; but by the end of November they were all dead, and I found 

 they had filled the space between the nest and ground or vault with 

 surrounding earth, all loosely mouldered down, which probably was the 

 earth they had removed to work their way out. 



1 [According to the date of this MS., 1789, Hunter's friend and correspondent 

 had obtained his title : see note \ p. 82.] 



