THE 



POPULAR SOIEXCE 

 MONTHLY. 



JULY, 1875. 

 ANENT ANTS. 



By E. E. LELAND. 



SINCE the earliest recorded observations of insect-life, tlie ant has 

 been a subject of especial comment and wonderment. Found 

 throughout the range of both temperate and the torrid zones, it is in 

 the tropics that the most interesting species abound, and where their 

 vast numbers and their industry and fearless pertinacity make tliem a 

 veritable scourge. 



Many confused, not to say fabulous, statements regarding them 

 have been published in books of travels, and copied in natural history 

 works ; but enough has been recorded concerning them, which has 

 the warrant of recent and high authority, to justify the views popu- 

 larly Ijeld as to their intelligence and sagacity. 



Mr. Bates, in " The Naturalist on the Amazon," devotes consider- 

 able space to them, and, in the descriptions following, very free use is 

 made of his delightful book, and most of the illustrations are borrowed 

 from that source. 



One of the chief peculiarities of the ants is their social relations. 

 Assembling in countless multitudes, they are divided into different 

 classes, each with a special order of duties to fulfill, but all working 

 harmoniously for a definite end the perpetuation of the species. 

 Their communities consist of males, females, and neuters ; with gen- 

 erally two and sometimes three distinct orders or castes of the latter. 

 Upon them devolves all the labor, the divisions being known as the 

 worker-minors and tbe worker-majors, the brunt of the work falling 

 upon the first, while the function of the worker-major, though not 

 definitely understood, seems to be that of a superintendent or a soldier, 

 or perhaps a combination of the two. 



One of the most interesting of the American species is the satiba, 

 or leaf-cutting ant [CEcodoma cephalotes). The workers of this spe- 

 cies are of three orders, and vary in size from two to seven lines. 

 Some idea of them maybe obtained from the accompanying woodcut. 



TOL. VII. 17 



