Year: 1876

after day, to feast upon the sweets,
till they were all consumed.


b These ants were very human
in their seliishness. They are like
miners who, finding gold, keep the
fact secret until such title has
been gained rs will secure them the
treasure. Men who find a good
thing do not run about proclaiming
the fact aud inviting others to share
with them. Some times, when there
Is scandal about their proceedings
even more serious than the proceed


ings themselves, they make haste to
go before investigating committees
to tell them how good thing they
really did have, and how much of it
they kept for themselves But con
fessions of that kind are as rare as
they are damaging. Men are not
usally communicative about their
good fortune. If people find it out,
It is because the facts advertise
themselves and cannot be concealed.


But all men are not absolutely
selfish, nor are all ants. History
abeands in instances of heroic char
acters who have given themselves
and all they had for the good Of
their fellows. Among pagan as
among Christian nations, such man
ifestations of heroic character have
not been infrequent, and IL is not an
uncommon thing to find men WHO
like to have Partakers in their good
fortune, but they are in the minority,
and we suppose the same may be
said of the ants. -af1a3 ~ .sz


Sir Johns experiment is not con-
elusive AS to the character of all
ants, and it would be unjust to apply
to all ants the selfshness which he
observed in the two to whom he
showed the pot of jelly. We re-
member once to have made q SINH
liar experiment. Filling a phial
partly with sugar it was suspended
from nail in the second-story of a
house, and, a. veteran black ant
was introduced into it. He was not
long in making the discovery that he
was in possession of a mine ofsweet-
ness as rich to him as a California
placer to miner. But the situa-
Ttion was novel one to him, and so,
after hasty survey of the premises,
he succeeded IN making his way ont
of the phIal, and IN some way out Of
the house, He seemed, however, to
have taken notes on the way.
Did he return alone? Not much.
When noticed a few days after
wards, line of ants was seen climb
ing up the ssclapboards" and enter
| ing the room through the wooden
ceiling, when they made their way
to the phial containing the sugar
AnothefJline was formed by those
who had been to the bonanza and
loaded themselves. with as much Of
the sugarias they could pack, and
thus kept coming and going until
every particle of the sugar had been
CARRIED off and conveyed to their
cells in theIant HILL ,te9s1 li7iov


& We are not sure that the original
discoverer of all this sweetness Jared
anytbetser than the original discover


erfof California goldF Possibly, af-
ter he,had piloted his companions TO
theItreaslire, they crowded him off
the track and appropriated it them
selves That Would Itelerably hu


man, but we had no, evidence of
that fact, and, as each seemed to be
satisfied with what he could gather
and carry of, It is fair to presume
that they worked in harmony and
Tor the .common good. This raises
the question whether in the ant
world, as in the world of human be-
ings, selfshness is on the increase.


jfWe shall have to leave Sir John
to solve that problem. / Perhaps in
the next experiment with ants. he
may select those in whom beneyo-
lence is more largely developed. Q