trials of a bringing up so absorbing and full of small cares. The obscurity of the enigma is replaced by the full light of truth, thanks to the following observation, made with all the leisure that a strict precision demands. In the first days of October two great clumps of blossoming asters at the door of my study became the rendezvous of a quantity of insects, among which the hive bee and Eristalis tenax were the most numerous. A gentle murmur arose from them, like that of which Virgil wrote, “Sæpe levi somnum suadebit inire susurro.” But if the poet finds in it only an invitation to slumber, the naturalist finds a subject for study; these small folk luxuriating on the last flowers of the year may perhaps afford him some new information. So I am on the watch before the two clumps with their countless lilac corollas. The air is perfectly still; the sun burns, the air is heavy—all signs of a coming storm; but these are conditions eminently favourable to the labours of the Hymenoptera, which seem to foresee to-morrow’s rain, and redouble their activity in turning the present hour to profit. The bees work ardently; the Eristalis fly clumsily from flower to flower. Now and then, into the midst of the peaceable throng who are swilling nectar, bursts a wasp, insect of rapine, attracted there by prey, not honey. Equally ardent in carnage, but unequal in strength, two species divide the chase; the common wasp, Vespa vulgaris, which catches Eristalis, and the hornet, V. crabro, which hunts hive bees. Both carry on the chase in the same way. They fly fast backwards and forwards over the flowers, and suddenly throw themselves on the prey which is on its guard and flies off, while their impulse carries them headfirst against the deserted flower. Then the chase is continued in the air, just as a sparrowhawk hunts a lark. But bee and Eristalis foil the wasp by their sudden turns, and it goes back to fly above the blossoms. By and by some insect less swift to escape gets captured. The common wasp instantly drops on the turf with its Eristalis, and I drop down too at the same moment, putting aside with both hands the dead leaves and bits of grass which might hinder my seeing clearly, and this is the drama which I behold, if proper precautions be taken not to scare the wasp.