lays its eggs,
one in each cell. It then hunts and procures spiders, which it deposits
in the cells and then seals the openings. These spiders are not killed
outright, but are partially paralyzed by the sting of the wasp. The
insect thus secures for her young a supply of fresh food. This wasp not
only knows the difference between the eggs that will produce female
young, but she also makes this knowledge useful. She always supplies the
females with more spiders than she does the males. The females are
larger and require more food, hence the discrimination. All of this care
and forethought is expended on young which the mother will never see.
Human love cannot give greater evidences of complete unselfishness.

I once removed a ball of eggs from the web of a spider. The mother clung
tenaciously to her treasure, and, when I tried to remove her with a pair
of forceps, she bit fiercely at the steel blades of the instrument. In
her great love for her offspring she lost all sense of fear. Time and
again I removed her several inches from the eggs; she would run about in
a distracted way, for all the world like a mother who had lost her baby,
until she found the ball of eggs. She would then seize it and attempt to
remove it to a place of safety. The naturalist, Bonnet, put a spider and
her bag of eggs in the pit of an ant-lion. The myrmeleon seized the
egg-bag and tore it away from the spider. Bonnet forced the spider out
of the pit, but she returned and chose to be dragged in and buried alive
rather than leave her eggs.[57]

[57] Bonnet, _OEuvres_; quoted also by Romanes, _Animal Intelligence_,
p. 205.

Earwigs lay their eggs, and then incubate them after the manner of the
hen. When the young are hatched out, the proud mother leads forth the
brood and shows unmistakable pride and affection in her children. On one
occasion, when a storm was coming up, I saw an earwig marshal her troop
of young ones, and lead them to a place of safety beneath the bark of a
tree.

M. Geer scattered the eggs of an earwig over the bottom of a box: "The
earwig carried them, however, one by one, into a certain part of the
box, and then remained constantly sitting upon the heap without ever
quitting it for a moment until the eggs were hatched."[58] This, I take
it, is at least an instance of love of offspring, even if it is not a
higher emotion. From the earwig's habit of watching over her young I am
inclined to believe that this insect possess