One last word: we know how furiously the Hymenoptera armed with a purely defensive dart—the Social Wasps, for instance—rush upon him who is bold enough to disturb their dwelling-house and punish him for his temerity. On the other hand, those whose sting is intended for killing game are very pacific, as though they were aware of the importance which the little drop of poison in their phial possesses for their family. This tiny drop is the safeguard of their race, I might say, its livelihood; and so they are very economical in its use, reserving it for the serious business of the chase, without any parade of vindictive courage. I was not once punished with a sting when I established myself amid the villages of our various Hunting Wasps, though I overturned their nests and stole the larvæ and the provisions. You must lay hold of the insect to make it use its weapon; and even then it does not always pierce the skin, unless you place within its reach a part more delicate than the fingers, such as, for instance, the wrist. CHAPTER VI THE LARVA AND THE NYMPH The egg of the Yellow-winged Sphex is white, elongated, cylindrical, slightly bow-shaped and measures three to four millimetres [17] in length. So far from being laid anywhere on the victim, at random, it is deposited on a specially favoured spot, which is always the same; in short, it is placed across the Cricket’s breast, a little to one side, between the first and second pair of legs. The egg of the White-edged Sphex and that of the Languedocian Sphex occupy a similar position: the first on the breast of a Locust, the second on the breast of an Ephippiger. [18] The point selected must present some peculiarity of great importance to the young larva’s safety, for I have never known it to vary. The egg hatches after three or four days. A very delicate wrapper tears asunder; and there lies before our eyes a feeble grub, transparent as crystal, a little attenuated and as it were compressed in front, slightly swollen at the back and adorned on either side with a narrow white thread formed of the principal trachean ducts. The frail creature occupies the same position as the egg. Its head is, so to speak, planted at the very spot where the upper end of the egg was fixed; and all the remainder simply rests upon the victim, without being fastened to it. The grub’s transparency enables us readily to distinguish rapid undulations inside it, ripples which follow one upon the other with mathematical regularity and which, beginning in the middle of the body, spread some forward and some backward. These fluctuating movements are due to the digestive canal, which takes long draughts of the juices drawn from the victim’s body.