looking to see if there is a wasp inside it.

"But the young wasps soon want green caterpillars and flies to eat, and
many a blue-bottle fly is killed by wasps."

"If wasps don't store up honey for the winter, what do they live upon
when there are no insects about?" asked Mary.

"When the fruit is all gone, and the nights get cold, about the
beginning of October, then some instinct tells them what to do, for only
a few of them live through the winter.

"The wasps cease to bring in any more food for the young. They tear open
the cells and expose the young grubs to the weather, when they die, or
the birds eat them. Generally they pinch them to death, for they will
not let them live to die of starvation; and while they are in this state
they do not feel pain. So what looks like cruelty is really kindness.

"The full-grown wasps soon become sleepy with cold and die off, all but
the few which live to be the mothers of the wasps next year."




VII.

_CHARLEY FOSTER'S PETS._

"Sweet is the love which Nature brings."--WORDSWORTH.