CHAP. X, OCCUPATIONS OP THE ANTS. 



mediate stations sometimes become permanent nests or 

 suburbs, which accordingly maintain a connection with 

 the capital city. While the recruiting is going on, 

 it appears to occasion no sensation in the original nest, 

 all goes on in it as usual ; and the ants that are not yet 

 recruited preserve their ordinary occupations : whence 

 it is evident that the change of station is not an en- 

 terprise undertaken by the whole community. If the 

 ants dislike their new city, they quit it for a third, and 

 even for a fourth ; and what is very remarkable, they 

 will sometimes return to their original one, before they 

 are entirely settled in the new station : when this hap- 

 pens, the recruiting goes on in opposite directions, and 

 the pairs pass each other upon the road. Huber ob- 

 serves, " you may stop the emigration for the present, 

 if you can arrest the first recruiter, and take away his 

 recruit." 



(342.) Besides these, the ants have certain periodical 

 occupations, according to the season of the year, which 

 are too important and curious to be passed over. One 

 of these is the sort of gymnastic exercise which they 

 take in the spring, upon first quitting their nests after 

 the long inactive season of winter. They usually 

 emerge from their subterranean quarters on some sunny 

 day, when, assembling in crowds on the surface of their 

 nest, they may be observed in continual motion, walk- 

 ing vigorously over it, and each other, without depart- 

 ing from home ; as if their object, before they resumed 

 their out-of-door employments, was, to habituate them- 

 selves, as Gould observes, " to the action of the air and 

 sun. These gymnastic exercises continue some few 

 days, and then the business of the year commences. 



(343.) It has been generally supposed that the 

 labours of the ant terminate with autumn, and that 

 during winter they remain inactive. But this is a 

 mistake, for these emblems of industry not only work 

 during every season of the year, but their labours are 

 going on even in the night. Gould affirms, " that 

 they even exceed the industrious bees, for the ant em- 

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