444< HABITATIONS OF INSECTS. 



egg to it, she wraps over the poppy lining so that even 

 the roof may be of this material ; and lastly closes its 

 mouth with a small hillock of earth a . The great depth 

 of the cell compared with the space which the single egg 

 and the accompanying food deposited in it occupy, de- 

 serves particular notice. This is not more than half an 

 inch at the bottom, the remaining two inches and a half 

 being subsequently filled with earth. — When you next 

 favour me with a visit, I can show you the cells of this 

 interesting insect as yet unknown to British entomolo- 

 gists, for which I am indebted to the kindness of M. La- 

 treille, who first scientifically described the species b . 



Apis centuncularis, A. Willughbiella, and other species 

 of the same family, like the preceding, cover the walls of 

 their cells with a coating of leaves, but are content with 

 a more sober colour, generally selecting for their hang- 

 ings the leaves of trees, especially of the rose, whence 

 they have been known by the name of the leaf-cutter 

 bees. They differ also from A. Papaveris in excavating 

 longer burrows, and filling them with several thimble- 

 shaped cells composed of portions of leaves so curiously 

 convoluted, that, if we were ignorant in what school they 

 have been taught to construct them, we should never 

 credit their being the work of an insect. Their enter- 

 taining history, so long ago as 1670, attracted the atten- 

 tion of our countrymen Ray, Lister, Willughby, and 

 Sir Edward King; but we are indebted for the most 

 complete account of their procedures to Reaumur. 



The mother bee first excavates a cylindrical hole 

 eight or ten inches long, in a horizontal direction, either 

 n JReaum. vi. 139-148. b Latr. Hist. Nat. des Fourmis, 297. 



