STUDYING THE WEATHER 



bottom of the ant-hill. The ground floor becoming, in its 

 turn, uninhabitable during the rainy season, the ants of 

 this species transport what most interests them to the higher 

 stories, and it is there that we usually find them assembled 

 with their pupae and eggs when their apartments under- 

 ground are flooded. 



Having ascertained the internal arrangement of their 

 habitations, it still remained to discover how ants, making 

 use of such a harsh material, could trace out and complete 

 works so extremely delicate with the assistance only of their 

 teeth ; how they could soften the earth for the purpose of 

 mining, kneading, and building with it ; and what cement 

 they employed to make the particles adhere to one another. 

 Did it depend upon a sort of mucilage or resin, or some 

 other liquid furnished by the ants themselves, resembling 

 that which the mason bee employs in building the nest to 

 which it gives so much solidity ? I ought, perhaps, to have 

 analysed the earth of which the ant-hills are composed, 

 but I hesitated to engage in a difficult task which hardly 

 came within my province. I therefore kept to the slow but 

 sure method of observation, by which I hoped to obtain the 

 same result. 



I hastened, then, to observe one of these ant-hills until 

 I should perceive some change in its form. 



The inhabitants of the nest I had selected stayed at home 

 during the day, or only went out by the subterranean 

 galleries which led into the meadows several feet away. 

 Though there were two or three small openings on the 

 surface of the nest, I saw none of the labourers pass out 

 that way, because it was too much exposed to the sun, 

 which the insects greatly dread. This ant-hill was round 

 in shape ; it rose in the grass at the border of a path and 

 was uninjured. 



"3 



