First published: 1963.
Library copy published: 1964.

“The world of wasps, as well as of their relatives the bees and ants, is largely a female world. The workers of social wasps are all females, and the nests of social wasps and bees, and of all ants, contain nothing but females except during certain brief periods. Those who profess to find similarities between the societies of insects and those of men need to consider this very important difference––as well as many others.” p. 6

“The more we learn, the more we realise how far we are from being able really to explain the behavior of wasps—or for that matter other animals, including man.” p. 8

“The ordinary common wasp, she who licks up the jam at picnics, is very much the elite of the wasp world. Even in the tropics and in the far corners of the earth there are no wasps that have acheived a higher social organization than these black urchins. And we still know very little about the inner workings of their societies.” p. 148