Let us try if sand will shorten the battle, of which the end does not yet seem in sight after an hour’s waiting. I lightly sprinkle the arena. The attack is resumed more fiercely than ever. The grub, feeling the sand, its natural dwelling-place, now also tries to slip away, the reckless one! What did I tell you? Its torus does not represent acquired prudence, but the necessity of the moment. The harsh experience of past misfortunes has not yet taught it the precious advantage which it would derive from its volute kept closed as long as danger lasts. Besides, not all are equally cautious on the firm support of my table. The biggest even seem ignorant of what they understood so well in their youth: the art of self-defence by rolling one’s self in a ball. I take up my story again with a fine-sized quarry, less liable to slip under the Scolia’s pushes. The grub, when assailed, does not curl up, does not contract into a ring, like its predecessor, which was younger and but half its size. It tosses about clumsily, lying on its side, half-opened. Its only attempt at defence is to wriggle; it opens, closes and reopens its big mandibular hooks. The Scolia grabs it at random, winds her rough, hairy legs around it and, for nearly fifteen minutes, strives her hardest atop of the rich dainty. At last, after a series of not very riotous affrays, the favourable position is gained, the propitious moment arrives and the sting is planted in the grub’s thorax, at a central spot, under the neck and level with the fore-legs. The effect is instantaneous: total inertia, save in the appendages of the head, the antennæ and mouth-pieces. I find the same results, the same prick at a precise, invariable spot, among my different operators, captured from time to time with a successful stroke of the net. Let us say, in conclusion, that the attack delivered by the Interrupted Scolia is much less fiery than that of her two-banded sister. This rough, sand-digging Hymenopteron has a clumsy gait and stiff, almost automatic movements. She does not easily repeat her dagger-thrust. Most of those with whom I experimented refused a second victim on the day after their exploits and on the following day. Half-asleep, they grew excited only when stimulated through my teasing them with a straw. Nor does the Two-banded Scolia, that more agile, more enthusiastic huntress, invariably unsheath when invited so to do. All those Nimrods are liable to moments of inaction which the presence of a new prey will not succeed in disturbing.