278 OBSERVATIONS ON 



ward, wet season. The day following, not 

 one flying ant was to be seen. 



Horse-ants travel home to their nests 

 laden with flies, which they have caught, 

 and the aurelise of smaller ants, which they 

 seize by violence. WHITE. 



In my Naturalist's Calendar for the year 

 1777, on September 6th, I find the fol- 

 lowing note to the article Flying Ants : 



I saw a prodigious swarm of these ants 

 flying about the top of some tall elm-trees 

 (close by my house); some were conti- 

 nually dropping to the ground as if from 

 the trees, and others rising up from the 

 ground : many of them were joined toge- 

 ther in copulation; and I imagine their 

 life is but short, for as soon as produced 

 from the egg by the heat of the sun, they 

 propagate their species, and soon after pe- 

 rish. They were black, somewhat like the 

 small black ant, and had four wings. I 

 saw also, at another place, a large sort 

 which were yellowish. On the 8th of Sep- 

 tember, 1785, I again observed the same 



