Strength has come; the larva is brawny enough not to dread the movements of the caterpillars' bodies.

Besides, the caterpillars, mortified by fasting and weakened by a prolonged torpor, become more and more incapable of defence.

The perils of the tender babe are succeeded by the security of the lusty stripling; and the grub, henceforth scorning its sheathed lift, lets itself drop upon the game that remains.

And thus the banquet ends in normal fashion.
That is what I saw in the nests of both species of the Eumenes and that is what I showed to friends who were even more surprised than I by these ingenious tactics.

The egg hanging from the ceiling, at a distance from the provisions, has naught to fear from the caterpillars, which flounder about below.