To-morrow arrives. The bright sunlight falls upon the glass container. The workers ascend in a crowd from under ground, eager to go in search of provisions. They butt against the transparent wall, tumble down, pick themselves up again and whirl round and round in a crazy swarm. Some, weary of dancing this continual saraband, alight on the ground, wander peevishly at random and then reenter their dwelling. Others take their places as the sun grows hotter. Well, not one of them, note this, not one of them scratches with her feet at the base of the treacherous circle. This means of escape is too far above their mental capacity. A few Wasps have spent the night out of doors. Here they are, coming in from the fields. Round and round the bell-glass they fly; at last, after much hesitation, one of them decides to dig under the edge of the enclosing wall. Others are quick to follow her lead. A passage is opened without difficulty. The Wasps go in. I do not interfere with them. When all the loiterers have reentered the nest, I close the breach with some earth. The narrow opening, if seen from within, might help the Wasps to escape; and I wish to leave the prisoners the honour of inventing the liberating tunnel. However poor the Wasp may be in judicious inspirations, escape has now become probable. Benefiting by their recent experience, the loiterers who have just entered will, I thought, set the others an example; they will teach them the tactics of digging at the base of the rampart. I judged my diggers too hastily. Of example set and taken, of learning by experience, there is not a sign. Inside the bell-glass not an attempt is made to employ the method which succeeded so well in the case of the home-comers. The insect population whirls round and round in the torrid atmosphere of the glass, but indulges in no enterprise. It flounders about, decimated from day to day by famine and the excessive heat. At the end of a week, not a creature is left alive. A heap of corpses covers the ground. Incapable of any innovation in its customs, the city has perished. This inept behaviour reminds me of the story of the wild Turkeys as told by Audubon. [66] A bait consisting of a few grains of millet lures them into a short underground passage, which leads to the centre of a wattled cage. When fed to repletion, the flock is ready to depart; but to use for their departure the way by which they entered, though it still yawns in the centre of the enclosure, is a manœuvre of too high an order for the stupid Turkeys. This path is dark, whereas daylight shines between the bars. The birds therefore revolve indefinitely against the trelliswork, until the trapper arrives and wrings their necks.