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136
My Studio Neighbors
·
W. Hamilton Gibson
38
After
considerable
needless
delay,
she
is
seen
for
once
motionless,
so
far
as
her
legs
are
concerned,
but
with
her
head
over
the
tunnel,
while,
with
flipping
wings
and
rapidly
waving
antennae,
she
investigates
its
depths.
Satisfied
that
all
is
well,
she
again
reaches
her
drowsy
spider,
by
a
tangled
circuit
of
about
a
quarter
of
a
mile--wasp
measurement--and
taking
the
victim
in
her
teeth
for
the
third
time,
finally
succeeds
in
reaching
the
burrow,
into
which,
without
a
particle
of
ceremony,
she
instantly
retreats,
dragging
her
helpless
burden
after
her.
Both
wasp
and
spider
are
soon
out
of
sight,
and
so
remain
perhaps
for
a
space
of
two
minutes,
when
the
tips
of
the
nervous
antennae
appear
at
the
doorway
and
the
wasp
emerges.
What
now
follows
is
most
curious
and
interesting.
With
an
energy
and
directness
in
striking
contrast
to
her
previous
proceedings,
she
proceeds
to
fill
the
cavity,
biting
the
earth
with
her
mandibles,
and
with
her
spiked
legs
kicking
and
shoving
in
the
loose
soil
thus
collected,
ever
and
anon
backing
up
to
the
hole
and
inserting
the
tip
of
her
tail
to
force
down
the
mass.
As
the
filling
is
nearly
completed,
with
the
fore
feet
and
jaws
the
surrounding
earth
is
scraped
for
material,
which
she
immediately
proceeds
to
pack
by
a
rhythmic
tamping
motion
of
the
tail,
until,
at
the
end
of
five
minutes,
perhaps,
the
ground-level
is
finally
reached,
the
surface
smoothed,
and
no
sign
remains
to
mark
the
grave
of
the
stupefied
spider
victim.
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