INSECTS HYMENOPTERA DIAGRAM 6. 139 



regularity, which are found in woods, with the cells partly filled 

 with honey, and partly with brood. Wasps' combs are not 

 formed of wax, but of a substance resembling grey or brownish 

 paper. We sometimes find pretty wasps' nests as large as 

 walnuts, which only contain a small number of cells. These nests 

 are made by the female only, who works, instead of doing nothing 

 like the queen bee, and she alone rears the larvae which emerge 

 from the eggs which she lays in the nest. But these larvae 

 produce workers which immediately begin to build the large nests 

 which are found in hollow trees, holes, and sometimes under the 

 roofs of houses. 



Ants. Ants are not less interesting than bees, although they 

 are of no known use to man. Ants, like bees, live in colonies, 

 consisting of males, females, and workers, the females in each 

 anthill preponderating. The workers have no wings, and are the 

 ants which are seen everywhere, and which are always so in- 

 teresting to observe. 



Ants have !no wax, and build underground dwellings which 

 sometimes contain a great number of halls and galleries, extending 

 a long distance below the surface. To watch an anthill and its 

 neighbourhood is one of the most interesting spectacles that can 

 be imagined. 



In the morning before sunrise, all is quiet in the neighbourhood, 

 and the anthill is closed, no opening being visible for the exit of 

 the ants, which are all inside. But when the sun has risen, we 

 see some workers clearing away the soil, and making doors by 

 which the other ants soon come out. In the evening, these gates 

 are again closed, and they are thus opened every morning and 

 shut every night. 



However, the other ants go in all directions, along paths 

 under the grass and moss, which correspond to their highways, 

 and sometimes extend very far. They come and go, meet, stop, 

 and touch each other's antennae as if to speak. Those which 

 return are generally loaded. Sometimes they have much 

 difficulty in carrying their burden, which may be a twig, a bit of 



