ips. For her game she chooses the Epeirae (E. fasciata,
E. sericea) (For the Garden-spiders known as the Banded Epeira and
the Silky Epeira cf. "The Life of the Spider": chapters 11, 13, 14 et
passim.--Translator's Note.), those fat Spiders, magnificently adorned,
who lie in wait at the centre of their large, vertical webs. I am not
sufficiently acquainted with her habits to describe them; above all, I
know nothing of her hunting-tactics. But her dwelling is familiar to
me: it is a burrow, which I have seen her begin, complete and close
according to the customary method of the Digger-wasps.

CHAPTER 2. THE SCOLIAE.

Were strength to take precedence over the other zoological attributes,
the Scoliae would hold a predominant place in the front rank of the
Wasps. Some of them may be compared in size with the little bird from
the north, the Golden-crested Wren, who comes to us at the time of the
first autumn mists and visits the rotten buds. The largest and most
imposing of our sting-bearers, the Carpenter-bee, the Bumble-bee, the
Hornet, cut a poor figure beside certain of the Scoliae. Of this group
of giants my district possesses the Garden Scolia (S. hortorum, VAN DER
LIND), who is over an inch and a half in length and measures four inches
from tip to tip of her outspread wings, and the Hemorrhoidal Scolia (S.
haemorrhoidalis, VAN DER LIND), who rivals the Garden Scolia in point of
size and is distinguished more particularly by the bundle of red hairs
bristling at the tip of the abdomen.

A black livery, with broad yellow patches; leathery wings,
amber-coloured, like the skin of an onion, and watered with purple
reflections; thick, knotted legs, covered with sharp hairs; a massive
frame; a powerful head, encased in a hard cranium; a stiff, clumsy gait;
a low, short, silent flight: this gives you a concise description of the
female, who is strongly equipped for her arduous task. The male, being a
mere philanderer, sports a more elegant pair of horns, is more daintily
clad and has a more graceful figure, without altogether losing the
quality of robustness which is his consort's leading characteristic.

It is not without a certain alarm that the insect-collector finds
himself for the first time confronted by the Garden Scolia. How is he to
capture the imposing creature, how to avoid its sting? If its effect
is in proportion to the Wasp's size, the sting of the Scolia must be
something terrible. The Hornet, though she