PROVISIONS AND DOMESTIC ANIMALS. lOI 



is thus suppressed. They have not yet finished their 

 manipulations, which must enable them to preserve 

 without further alteration the provisions which they 

 have already rendered palatable. They bring out all 

 their provisions to the sun, dry them, and take them 

 back to the barns. As long as winter lasts they feed 

 on this sweet flour. An anatomical peculiarity enables 

 them to make the most of it ; their mouth is so 

 arranged that they can absorb solid particles and 

 eat the albuminous powder. In this they differ from 

 their northern kin, who are obliged to feed exclusively 

 on juices. 



I have compared the labours of these ants to those 

 of the wine-grower. Both of them in fact utilise the 

 chemical phenomena going on in living matter ; both 

 of them know how at a given moment to prevent 

 the transformation from going further. Neither 

 of them for the rest take into account the part 

 played by diastasis and ferments. The ancestors 

 of one as of the other have by chance found out the 

 method, and they transmit it from generation to 

 generation.^ 



Agricultural Ants. — The art of amassing stores is 

 still more highly perfected by an Ant which inhabits 

 North America. It is called the Pogonomyrmex 

 barbatus, or, on account of its customs, the Agri- 

 cultural Ant. It carries out a certain number of 

 preparatory acts, and pushes foresight further than 

 any other animal, since it looks after its property 

 while still growing. It is grain which these insects 

 collect, but only a single species of graminaceous 

 grain. This choice leads them to spend great trouble 



' J. Treherne Moggridge, Harvesling Ants and Trap-Door Spiders, 

 London, 1873, pp. 16-60. 



