136 
Psyche 
[December 
location, going there in the spring and meeting sister 
queens, and founding their nests near by. This marked 
difference between the two populations exists, however : in 
the northern Polistes, only the queens survive the winter 
and are ready to scatter in the spring, whereas in the 
tropical species, some of those which found new colonies 
may be workers. Bequaert ( loc . cit. p. 76) says that in 
gome species of tropical Polistes, “it is often hardly possible 
to distinguish externally workers from fertile females, and 
in some of the species it is even doubtful whether a dif- 
ferentiated worker caste is present.” 
Of course, if all of the wasps built close to the old home, 
there would be no world-wide distribution. Some of them 
fare forth alone to greater distances. Even so small a trait 
as this shows that they have individual psychological char- 
acteristics upon which selection may play. The inclination 
to stay near the old home or the inclination to venture far- 
ther may be very significant in the development of the 
habits of the species. It is the difference between conserva- 
tism and initiative, which, small in the beginning, may be 
vast in the end. 
In this instance of fifty P. rubiginosis that were seen on 
the nest October 13, only twenty-four appeared the next 
spring, building the four nests already referred to. Some 
of the other 26 must have gone to greater distances to build, 
unless the mortality was that great. The powder-houses in 
which these nests were found had presented the same op- 
portunities for this species to build for the past five years, 
but this is the first time that one of these pioneers found it 
good for a nest, and fixed a site for twenty-four of her less 
venturesome descendants. Of course, in studies of this 
kind we can follow only the lives of those conservative indi- 
viduals which remain near home; of those venturesome 
pioneers which blaze new trails, we can have nothing to 
say. The first rubiginosis queen that came to this shed 
must have ventured some distance from her old home, per- 
haps in some hollow tree. 
With these four new nests of rubiginosis at hand, all 
within easy reach of the eye (an unusual condition), I made 
plans for learning more of their habits, but unfortunately 
