HOIENOPTERA. 133 



fluids, elaborated in their stomach and then disgorged. 

 But I have no time to tell the hundredth part of Ant- 

 lore ; how some species, as Formica Sanguinea, invade 

 the nests of others and plunder them of their pupae, 

 which they carry off to their own colonies and bring up 

 as slaves, how they milk the Plant-lice which they im- 

 prison in their nests, how when they become too 

 numerous the surplus population emigrates, how the 

 new colony uses all sorts of devices to induce other 

 ants to join them ; nor can I do more than refer to the 

 bull-dog courage sometimes exhibited, as when an ant 

 has attached itself to some large beetle and chosen 

 to die there rather than relax its hold ! It is said that 

 in Switzerland ants are crushed into a plaster, and 

 applied to the head as a cure-for the headache, and that 

 Swiss school girls rub their foreheads with the insects, 

 '^ pour se fortifier la memoirey Formic acid ant-baths 

 are also used in Switzerland and Germany, according to 

 Mr. Staveley. A Russian lady at Wildbad was ordered to 

 visit a village in the Black Forest, to strengthen herself 

 by the use of ant-baths ; and a child, four years old, 

 " who had dwindled away to a mere skeleton," is said 

 to have had her strength completely restored by a course 

 of ant baths. The ants are the large Wood-ants which 

 are collected with earth leaves, etc., and placed in bags, 

 and hot water poured on them ; they are left for a time 

 and the bath is ready for use. Then ant baths are 

 said to be used at Wiesbaden, but I have been unable 

 to learn anything about them from a friend who has 

 just returned from a few weeks' sojourn there. 



The Solitary-ants (3Iutillidca) are not much known 

 in this country ; the females are wingless. Matilla 



