[Illustration: _Section of Cells, showing the ways of escape._] One of the most striking facts in connexion with the proceedings of this little creature has yet to be brought under our notice. It will be readily admitted that the first egg deposited at the bottom of the gallery will be the first, in point of time, that will be hatched, and, consequently, the first to require to make its escape from the wooden prison-house of its birth. How is it possible for this to take place, when above the poor prisoner's head are ten or twelve cells full of other occupants, and each shut in with a hard ceiling and floor? By referring to the figure, we obtain a clue to this enigma. It is here seen that there are holes which communicate with the tunnel within. The uppermost of these holes was the one by means of which the tunnel was first formed, but the two lower ones have been expressly formed by the carpenter-bee to provide against the dilemma in which her young would otherwise have been placed. They form as it were posterns or back doors by which, when the insect is perfected, it is easily enabled to make its escape. Singular, indeed, it is, that the insects, previous to passing into their last transformation, arrange themselves with their heads downwards, so that every one of them generally emerges at the so-called back-door of the mansion. There are many similar instances in natural history of the manifest wisdom and forethought of the Creator of all things, visible and invisible, but we may safely say there are not many which show it in so clear and striking a point of view as this. It is to be remembered this industrious insect in the arrangements in question does not act from past experience. She never saw her young brood, nor could learn of herself their wants and dispositions, yet her plans for their welfare are as admirably contrived as if she had brought up generation after generation under her own eye, and had learnt wisdom by the lapse of years. Plainly, therefore, her actions are all directed by an impulse given her from God, and we may well exclaim with the wise king of old, it is God who "doth instruct her to discretion, and doth teach her." Altogether, what an example of patience and cheerfulness in her labours, and of admirable wisdom in their performance, is presented to us by this little sketch of the history of the carpenter-bee's nest!