Gloucester County Democrat. (Woodbury, N.J.) 1878-1932, 1884-01-31

wallpaper, but to encourage the growth
of peculiar fungus that soon appears
upon it. This ant is the Sanba.
THE CATTLE OF THE ANTS.
"As human farmers have cattle,n said
the speaker, $50 have ants. They herd
the little insect sphis, feeding them upon
the sap of plants, that exudes from the
aphis in the form of clear drop of
honey-like matter which the ants are
very fond OF. These insects are then
herded as COWS, and domesticated in the
houses of the ants; some species
actually breeding them as We do
cattle, rearing them from the
eggs, taking the young from their
nests and placing them on the ten
der shoots without, carrying them within
upon the approach of cold. Another ant
builds regular cow-shed or stable for
its herd. that is made Of bits of wood,
arched and erected with great care.
When the ants wish to milk their cows
they tap and caress them with their an
tenn@ until they give out the honey, and
several ants have been observed waiting
n line to receive their supply.
PETS.
'Besides these insects" continued the
ant authority, ''ants keep many others
for pets, some on account of their pecu-
liar odor, and some for other reasons
The fornica rufa has over a thousand do
mestic animals and pets, and Andre gives
list of five hundred and eighty odd
species of insects that are always found
in the nests of ants. Of these over five
hundred were beetles.
SLAVES.
Like many people, and ourselves
twenty years ago, the ants are slave
dealers, and this is one of the most re-
markable features of ant life The slave
holding ants Polyergus rufescens) have
become SO dependent upon their slaves
that they really starve to death if de-
prived of them. According to Sir John
Lubbock and Huber even their bodily
structure has undergone a change; the
mandibles have lost their teeth, and have
become mere nippers, deadly weapons,
indeed, but useless except in war. They
have lost the greater part of their in
stincts; their art, that is the power of
building; their domestic habits, for they
show no care for their own young, all
this being done by the slaves; their in
dustry-they take no part in providing
the daily supplies. If the colony changes
the situation of the nest the masters are
all carried on the backs of the slaves to
the new one. As said before, they have
even lost the habit of feeding. Huber
placed thirty of them with some Larvae
and purp@ and asupply Of honey in box
AT first he said they appeared to pay
some little attention to the larv@; they
carried them here and there, but present
ly replaced them. More than one-half of
these aristocrats died of hunger in less
than two days. They had not even
traced out dwelling, and the fewants
still in existence were languid and with
out strength. Finally they were given
one of their black companions, and this
individual, unassisted, established order,
formed chamber in the earth, gathered
together the Larvae, extricated several
young ants that were ready to quit the
condition of pupe, and preserved the Life
of the remaining ants.
ANTS AS HoNEY-BAGs.
"Of course" I" said the naturalist, SAINTS
cannot make bottles and jars to keep
liquid food, but they get over this in q re-
markable manner; in fact, they make sew
eral of their companions serve as bottles
This is the honey-ant of Mexico and Col
orado. For long time there has been
dish served as dessert at Mexican tables
that the average American did not en-
tirely understand. 1t was an oval
bell of honey, and DR.. McCook, of Phil
adelphia, has shown that the curious
dish was merely the bottled-up ants
themselves.
"These ants are nocturnal in habit,
and their food consists of honey which
exudes from gals on the scrub-oak The
ants work all night long gathering this
sweet exudation, which they do not use
Immediately for food, but store up in
remarkable manner, certain among them
being converted into living honeycombs
in the following way: The abdomen of
an ant is walled by ten movable plates,
underlaid by an elastic membrane;
hence, it is capable of great expansion
The abdominal intestine contains sac
like cavity, called the crop, anterior to
the stomach. This crop is very distend-
ible, but can be readily contracted by
the aid of surrounding muscles. The
honey with which the crop of the pros
pecting ant is filed is forced by muscu-
lar contraction from its mouth into that
of the honey-bearers, and this is con-
tinued until the crop and the abdo-
men of the latter become ex-
traordinarily distended, and the
ant resembles round sac
of amber-colored honey of the size
of large pea, with the head and thorax
like small appendages on one side. There
is no more remarkable phenomenon in the
whole range of animal life. By the eDor
nous distention of the crop the remain
ino organs of the abdomen are com