S8 ANTS. 



lain : as for the capital nest, there was no 

 need of exercising my charity towards it. 



M. de la Loubere says, in his relation 

 of Siam, that, in a certain part of that king- 

 dom, which lies open to great inundations, 

 all the Ants make their settlements upon 

 trees: no Ants'* nests are to be seen any 

 where else. I need not insert here what the 

 author says about those insects : you may see 

 his relation. 



Here follows a curious experiment, which 

 I made under the same ground, where I had 

 three Ants'* nests. I undertook to make a 

 fourth, and went about it in the following 

 manner : — In a corner of a kind of terrace, at 

 a considerable distance from the box, I found 

 a hole swarming with Ants, much larger than 

 all those I had already seen ; but they were 

 not so well provided, with corn, nor under so 

 good a government. I made a hole in the 

 box like that of an Ant''s nest ; and laid, as 

 it were, the foundations of a new city. After- 

 wards I got as many Ants as I could out of 

 the nest in the terrace, and put them into a 

 bottle, to give them a new habitation in my 

 box; and because I was afraid they would 



