767 
No. 145.] 
maculata, Linnseus) is also frequently noticed in the same situa¬ 
tions. These insects are so much larger and more powerful than 
the ants that the latter make no attempts to drive them away 
as they do most other intruders. They quietly stand aside and 
permit the large wasp to pilfer from them what would serve as 
a meal for a dozen of their own family. 
Other wasp-like insects, of a smaller size, pertaining to the 
family Crabronidje, seize and carry off the plant-lice. These 
excavate holes in decaying posts, rails and similar situations, and 
collect young spiders for food for their young, several of the spe¬ 
cies gathering plant-lice for the same purpose. These they 
enclose in the same cells in which they drop their eggs, the egg 
being in the bottom of the cell, often attached to the end of the 
abdomen of an aphis, that the young worm when it hatches may 
find its food placed directly in contact with its mouth ; and the 
exact quantity of food is put into each cell before it is sealed up, 
which the worm will require for bringing it to maturity. But 
the most astonishing trait in the instincts of these small wasps, is 
their manner ot preserving the spiders and other food which they 
gather. The wasp is evidently aware that if it kills the spider or 
aphis before packing it in its cell, it will become putrid and 
unadapted for the nourifhment of the worm before the latter will 
hatch from the egg. On the other hand, if the young spiders are 
enclosed in the cell alive and in full vigor, their incessant strug¬ 
gles to escape from their prison will wound and destroy the egg 
or the young tender worm which is in the same cell. How is the 
wasp to proceed in this dilemma without salt or spices with 
which to preserve from putrefaction the stock of provisions which 
she amasses? Nature has furnished her with a resort for effecting 
this, superior to any known to man for a like purpose; and if 
some chemist, taking the hint from these little insects, could 
devise some analogous mode whereby we might preserve animal 
food for weeks in all the perfection it has when newly slaugh¬ 
tered, it would be a discovery conducive to human health and 
comfort equal to any of the other great discoveries of this remark¬ 
able age. The wasp on seizing her prey appears to sting it 
slightly, injecting into the wound only so much venom as will 
