66 LIST OF FLIES. 



breast, for legs ; wings, slips from the light brown web of 

 a feather in the snipe or starling's wing. 



The red ant fly plants her colony on the ground, in or 

 near woods, and often on the sloping banks of rivers and 

 small streams, in dry and sheltered places, there they find 

 protection and materials for building their city, which is 

 composed of small pieces of dried sticks, straws, stones, and 

 dead leaves, etc., which they form into mounds or beds, 

 with passages into the interior, extending the suburbs as 

 the citizens increase. There are several beds in Macker- 

 shaw, on the Skell, and in Magdalen's wood opposite Hack- 

 fall, on the Ure. Their sizes vary in different situations ; 

 the largest are found in the dells and sheltered places on 

 the edges of the moors. Near Mr. CaJ vert's stone quarry, 

 in Skellgill, there are several beds, and the ants are larger 

 than those below. The winged portion begin to leave their 

 colony next month in vast swarms ; the country people 

 sometimes see them take wing on warm sultry days, which, 

 they say, is prognostic of wet weather. They are a mar- 

 vellous insect ; the Supreme has written their everlasting 

 laws, which they all instinctively obey, and the power that 

 entailed labour upon them made that labour voluntary. 

 There is a large bed just within the low fence of the plan- 

 tation in Mall White, well worth the walk to see. The 

 scriptural mandate, "Go to the ant," etc., may be applied 

 generally, for as well as their lessons of industry they 

 cannot but create the most lively feelings of admiration and 

 wonder in all who behold them. 



78TH. WHITE-LEGGED DUN. Full length about three- 

 eighths ; feelers three-eighths, rankly marked light and 

 dark ; wings a dark brown dun or chocolate hue, with light 

 reddish touches ; eyes, shoulders, and -body, dark brown 

 dun, almost black ; part of thighs, legs, and feet, a dull 

 white. When looked through to the light is of a dark dun 



