SOCIAL-WASPS. 73 



entrance is placed either at the top or on the side, 

 and the whole mound is beaten down externally, 

 especially at the summit, resembling a much-used 

 footpath. From the entrance, the passage into the 

 mound descends vertically for one or two feet, and 

 is thence continued obliquely downwards until it ter- 

 minates in an apartment, within which the industrious 

 prairie-dog constructs, on the approach of cold 

 weather, a comfortable, cell for his winter's sleep. 

 The cell, which is composed of fine dry grass, is 

 globular in form, with an opening at top, capable of 

 admitting the finger; and the whole is so firmly 

 compacted, that it might, without injury, be rolled 

 over the floor*." 



In case of need, the wasp is abundantly fur- 

 nished by nature with instruments for excavating a 

 burrow out of the solid ground, as she no doubt 

 most commonly does, — digging the earth with her 

 strong mandibles, and carrying it off or pushing it 

 out as she proceeds. The entrance-gallery is about 

 an inch or less in diameter, and usually runs in a 

 winding or zigzag direction, from one to two feet in 

 depth. In the chamber to which this gallery leads, 

 and which, when completed, is from one to two feet 

 in diameter, the mother wasp lays the foundations of 

 her city, beginning with the walls. 



The building materials employed by wasps were 

 long a matter of conjecture to scientific inquirers; for 

 the bluish-grey papery substance of the whole struc- 

 ture has no resemblance to any sort of wax employed 

 by bees for a similar purpose. Now that the discovery 

 has been made, we can with difficulty bring our- 

 selves to believe that a naturalist so acute and inde- 

 fatigable as M. Reaumur should have, for twenty 

 years, as he tells us, endeavoured, without success, 



* American Ornithology, by Charles Lucicn Bunaparte. Vol.i. 

 p. 63. 



