Packard.] RELATIONS OF INSECTS TO MAN. 
79 
My own observations on another wasp (Odynerus albopha- 
leratus ), which makes its round cells of clay, placing them for 
safety in the loose nest of the American Tent Caterpillar, 
have shown me that Fabre’s account must be correct. On 
opening these cells, they were found to be filled with minute 
caterpillars, which were in various stages of growth between 
the fully formed caterpillar and the chrysalis. They were 
alive, but benumbed, and in some cases with life enough to 
finish their transformations into the chrysalis state. Here 
they were waiting patiently each for his turn to be devoured 
by the young wasp. What a marvellous instinct on the part 
of the wasp, and how much more wonderful when we remem¬ 
ber that this is a habit of but certain groups of wasps, and 
that it must have been acquired by fig. go. 
them from some ancestor which had to 
find out for itself the secret of sting, 
ing its victim so as to simply paralyze 
and not kill outright the luckless 
subject of the experiment. Again, 
was the discovery made by accident, 
or did our ancestral wasp go about it Chrysis. 
like a philosopher, and after conducting a series of experi¬ 
ments, guided by the “scientific use of the imagination” 
alight finally upon just the weak spot in its victim’s harness 
in which to insert its sting? This thought may be consid¬ 
ered as twaddle by some, but in all seriousness we would say 
that nature must have had that insect in training. Any one 
who has observed a wasp building its nest, or a Chrysis 
wasp (Fig. 60) exploring the nail holes in a post with 
its inquisitive sting, combining the terrible qualities of a 
poisoned dagger with the delicate touch of a finger, and 
then imagines the series of deductions following each trial 
of the sting, the momentous result attending the exploita¬ 
tion to the future weal of the Chrysis family, and the ulti¬ 
mate good to the species — how can he say that there we 
15 
