of it. This is gathered into barrels and 
is black because of the smoke that gets 
into it. It was this sort of tar that 
Benjamin Franklin had his experience 
with one time in Philadelphia. He was 
running along on the tops of tar bar- 
rels on the wharf one fine day with his 
Sunday clothes on. The head of one 
barrel was not in good condition, and 
so Benjamin went down into it. The 
next issue of his paper had a very 
amusing account of the accident in 
which Franklin used his powers to 
make puns to great advantage in mak- 
ing fun at his own expense. 
ANTS.—Would you like to get a 
clean skeleton of any small animal? 
Place the body near or upon an ant hill 
and the little workers will clean it off 
for you perfectly, picking every bone 
as Clean as if they were under contract 
with a forfeit for every scrap of flesh, 
skin, or sinew left upon any bone. 
They like meat so well that they will 
attack animals that are many times 
larger than themselves and carry the 
work to a successful end. There are 
tireevkinds of. ants in -an ant bill 
males, females, and neuters. The males 
and females have wings and do no 
work to speak of. They are always 
waited upon very carefully by the neu- 
ters who have no wings, but are noted 
for their industry, skill, and strength. 
It has been said that the ant stores up 
large quantities of grain in the summer 
for winter use. Whoever said that was 
not well acquainted with his subject. 
In winter the ants neither eat nor 
work. Some of the neuters have 
their jaws, or mandibles, made much 
larger than the rest. These are the 
soldiers, and they fight with greater 
fierceness than any other creatures. 
Huber, the blind naturalist who told 
the world so many astonishing things 
about bees, describes a great fight he 
once saw between two colonies of these 
little warriors. ‘‘I shall not say what 
lighted up discord between these two 
republics, the one as populous as the 
other. The two armies met midway 
between their respective residences. 
Their serried columns reached from 
the field of battle to the nest, and were 
two feet in width. The field of battle, 
which extended over a space of two or 
three square feet, was strewn with dead 
bodies and wounded; it was also 
covered with venom, and exhaled a 
penetrating odor. The struggle began 
between two ants, which locked them- 
selves together with their mandibles, 
while they raised themselves upon 
their legs. They quickly grasped each 
other so tightly that they rolled one 
over the other in the dust. When 
night came they stopped fighting, but 
the next morning they went at it again 
and piled the ground with slain and 
wounded.” Their stings hurt because 
they carry a liquid that is like that 
found in nettles and in the hairs and 
other parts of certain caterpillars. 
This is called formic acid, and is made 
by chemists for certain purposes. 
The red ant dislikes to work if he can 
get slaves to do it forhim. Perhaps 
we should say if ske can get it done for 
her, because these neuters are rather 
more like females than like male ants. 
They make war purposely to get into 
the homes of other colonies to carry 
away their eggs and baby ants. They 
bring these up to wait upon them. 
When they go ona journey the slaves 
have to carry their owners, and some- 
times they even feed them until they 
refuse to feed themselves. They have 
been known to die of hunger with 
plenty of food within easy reach, but 
with no slave at hand to place it before 
them. In going out to fight for the 
offspring of other ants they go in 
regular columns, and those that are 
left after the slaughter return home in 
the same order, their solid trains some- 
times extending more than a hundred 
feet. Some ants keep cows. Plant 
lice have honeydew in their bodies, 
and when well fed they give out a 
great deal of it. Ants are fond of it. 
They sometimes confine the plant lice, 
feed them, and milk the honey-dew 
from the bodies of their captors. A 
German scientist named Simon, has 
recently returned from Australia with 
some great stories about ants. He 
says he suffered much from their 
attacks. In trying to get rid of them 
in many ways he at last hit upon the 
idea of spreading a poison where they 
would have to pass across it. He used 
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