1912] The Ottawa Naturalist. 153 



July 1st, and each time the bird was either seen or heard, or both, 

 so that there can be little doubt that it is breeding there. In 

 consequence of a trip to Alberta which occupied all of June, the 

 writer has not yet had an opportunity of visiting the spot, but 

 hopes yet to see the bird before the opportunity is gone. There 

 can be little doubt that this species is spreading through the 

 west end of Ontario, which is the case with the following species. 



The Carolina Wren has a little the start of the Chat as far 

 as Ontario is concerned, although the addition of the bird to our 

 fauna took place at a much later date, the first specimen being 

 taken by Mr. L. H. Smith, at Forest, Ont., in February, 1891. 

 After that it was not reported for the Province until the present 

 contingent of visitors began to go to Point Pelee in 1905, where 

 it was found that the bird was quite common. 



On the walk previously referred to, the Wren was found 

 scattered through the west end of the Province in only slightly 

 greater numbers than the Chat, but it has been reported from 

 many more districts and three have been seen and heard right 

 around the city of London, one of which in the spring of 1910 

 looked like a probable breeder, but the opportunity to prove 

 this did not occur. A pair spent a couple of summers at St. 

 Thomas, between April, 1905, and the winter of 1906-07, 

 and a sufficient number of single notes have been made for 

 various parts of the west end of Ontario to satisfy anyone that 

 the bird nests in scattered places irregularly over the whole 

 west end of the Province. 



GOSSAMER SPIDERS. 



It is curious to note how certain insects anticipated man in 

 some of the activities and achievements on which he prides 

 himself. The wonderful social organization of the ants, with 

 their soldiers and slaves, their roads and tunnels, their domestic 

 animals and fungus gardens, was doubtless in existence when 

 our paleolithic forefathers were waging a dubious w T arfare with 

 the cave bear and the sabre-toothed tiger. Wasps were macer- 

 ating wood fibre into pulp and spreading it out into paper untold 

 ages before the first whiff of sulphite fumes reached Major Hill 

 Park, while another group the mud-daubers by stinging a 

 captured spider so as to paralyze without killing him outright 

 and thus preserve him as food for their larvae, may be said to 

 have forestalled in a way our modern methods of cold storage. 

 As for the bees, perhaps in the far future we may be able to 



