different from that of the paralysers, is infallible in its
death-dealing efficacy. Whether she deliver her thrust lying on the
ground or standing erect, she holds the Bee in front of her, breast to
breast, head to head. In this posture all that she need do is to curve
her abdomen in order to reach the gap in the neck and plunge the sting
with an upward slant into her captive's head. Suppose the two insects
to be gripping each other in the reverse attitude, imagine the dirk
to slant slightly in the opposite direction; the results would be
absolutely different and the sting, driven downwards, would pierce
the first thoracic ganglion and produce merely partial paralysis. What
skill, to sacrifice a wretched Bee! In what fencing-school was the
slayer taught her terrible upward blow under the chin?

If she learnt it, how is it that her victim, such a past mistress in
architecture, such an adept in socialistic polity, has so far learnt no
corresponding trick to serve in her own defence? She is as powerful
as her executioner; like the other, she carries a rapier, an even more
formidable one and more painful, at least to my fingers. For centuries
and centuries the Philanthus has been storing her away in her cellars;
and the poor innocent meekly submits, without being taught by the annual
extermination of her race how to deliver herself from the aggressor by a
well-aimed thrust. I despair of ever understanding how the assailant has
acquired her talent for inflicting sudden death, when the assailed,
who is better-armed and quite as strong, wields her dagger anyhow and
therefore ineffectively. If the one has learnt by prolonged practice
in attack, the other should also have learnt by prolonged practice in
defence, for attack and defence possess a like merit in the fight for
life. Among the theorists of the day, is there one clear-sighted enough
to solve the riddle for us?

If so, I will take the opportunity of putting to him a second problem
that puzzles me: the carelessness, nay, more, the stupidity of the Bee
in the presence of the Philanthus. You would be inclined to think that
the victim of persecution, learning gradually from the misfortunes
suffered by her family, would show distress at the ravisher's approach
and at least attempt to escape. In my cages I see nothing of the sort.
Once the first excitement due to incarceration under the bell-glass or
the wire-gauze cover has passed, the Bee seems hardly to trouble about
her