er art in conformity with the unfamiliar nervous
organization?

This second alternative is highly improbable. It would be nonsense to
expect to see the paralyser vary the number and the distribution of the
wounds according to the genus of the victim. Supremely skilled in the
task that has fallen to its lot, the insect knows nothing further.

The first alternative seems to offer a certain chance and deserves a
test. I offer the Tachytes, deprived of her Mantis, a small Grasshopper,
whose hind-legs I amputate to prevent his leaping. The disabled Acridian
jogs along the sand. The Wasp flies round him for a moment, casts a
contemptuous glance upon the cripple and withdraws without attempting
action. Let the prey offered be large or small, green or grey, short
or long, rather like the Mantis or quite different, all my efforts
miscarry. The Tachytes recognizes in an instant that this is no
business of hers; this is not her family game; she goes off without even
honouring my Grasshoppers with a peck of her mandibles.

This stubborn refusal is not due to gastronomical causes. I have stated
that the larvae reared by my own hands feed on young Grasshoppers as
readily as on young Mantes; they do not seem to perceive any difference
between the two dishes; they thrive equally on the game chosen by me
and that selected by the mother. If the mother sets no value on the
Grasshopper, what then can be the reason of her refusal? I can see only
one: this quarry, which is not hers, perhaps inspires her with fear, as
any unknown thing might do; the ferocious Mantis does not alarm her,
but the peaceable Grasshopper terrifies her. And then, if she were to
overcome her apprehensions, she does not know how to master the Acridian
and, above all, how to operate upon him. To every man his trade, to
every Wasp her own way of wielding her sting. Modify the conditions ever
so slightly; and these skilful paralysers are at an utter loss.

To every insect also its own art of fashioning the cocoon, an art which
varies greatly, an art in which the larva displays all the resources
of its instincts. The Tachytes, the Bembeces, the Stizi, the Palari and
other burrowers build composite cocoons, hard as fruit-stones, formed of
an encrustation of sand in a network of silk. We are already acquainted
with the work of the Bembex. I will recall the fact that their larva
first weaves a conical, horizontal bag of pure white silk, with wide
meshes, held in place by