When employed upon the building itself, the bee exhibited the restless disposition peculiar to most hymenopterous[P] insects; for she did not go on with one particular portion of her wall, but ran about from place to place every time she came to work. At first, when we saw her running from the bottom to the top of her building, we naturally imagined that she went up for some of the bricklayer’s mortar to mix with her own materials; but upon minutely examining the walls afterwards, no lime could be discovered in their structure similar to that which was apparent in the nest found in the wall of Greenwich Park.
Réaumur mentions another sort of mason-bee, which selects a small cavity in a stone, in which she forms her nest of garden-mould moistened with gluten, and afterwards closes the whole with the same material.
Cells of Chalicodoma.
[In the accompanying illustration is shown a series of cells which are constructed by an insect which is closely related to the rose-cutter bee of our own country, to which it bears a close resemblance.
It is a native of South Africa, and its name is Chalicodoma cœlocerus. The insect is about half an inch in length, and the colour of the head and body is black, that of the abdomen being brick red.
The nest is made of mud, which is collected by the patient insect and stuck against walls, trunks of trees, and similar localities. In this lump of mud the insect excavates a small number of burrows, each of which contains several cells. If the reader will refer to the central burrow, he will see that it is divided into three cells. The specimen from which this drawing is taken may be seen in the British Museum.
There is another South African insect which makes its mud nest, and fastens it against trees and walls. This is called Synagris calida, and its colour is almost dingy black, the only exception being the red tip to the abdomen. The holes seen in the engraving are the apertures through which the young brood has escaped into the world. The nest is represented of half its natural size.]
