EA R VESTING A NTS. 165 



ledge goes, only two out of tlie 104 species of Euro- 

 pean ants are possessed of the habit of collecting and 

 storing seed, and it may be reasonably asked how it 

 can have come about, if this is the case, that the 

 ancient authors were so well acquainted with the fact. 



The explanation is that these writers lived on the 

 shores of the Mediterranean, where these two species 

 — Affa harhara and structor — are extremely common 

 objects, both on account of their abundance and their 

 habits. The long trains of harvesters remain exposed 

 to view for hours together, and structor seeks the 

 neighbourhood or even the interior of towns, so that 

 these ants arrest the attention even of the unobservant, 

 and often become familiar as the sparrows. 



There can be little doubt that these two ants 

 display the same habits throughout all the warmer 

 districts which they inhabit, but whether they do so 

 in Switzerland, Germany, Northern France, and the 

 other colder portions of their range, remains one of 

 the many interesting cjuestions which still await 

 investigation. 



Mr. F. Smith has recorded the presence of Atta 

 harbara in Palestine, and I have lately obtained some 

 curious evidence which goes to show that harvesting 

 ants not only carried on their operations in times 

 past in that country, but that their seed-stores were 

 on a much larger scale than any I have observed on 

 the Itiviera. 



I am indebted to Dr. F. A. Pratt for the infor- 

 mation that mention was made of ants and their 

 stores in the Misna, that codification of the tradi- 

 tionary and unwritten laws of the Jews, whicli was 

 commenced after the birth of Christ under the presi- 



