ON THE HABITS OF ANTS. 



LECTURE III. 



I. 



The Anthropoid apes no doubt approach more nearly to 

 Man in bodily structure than do any other animals ; but 

 when we consider the habits of Ants, their social organ- 

 ization, their large communities, elaborate habitations, 

 their roadways, their possession of domestic animals, and 

 even, in some cases, of slaves, it must be admitted that 

 they have a fair claim to rank next to man in the scale 

 of intelligence. They present, moreover, not only a 

 most interesting but also a very extensive field of study. 

 In this country we have nearly thirty species ; but ants 

 become more numerous, in species as well as individuals, 

 in warmer countries, and more than seven hundred kinds 

 are known. Even this large number is certainly far 

 short of those actually in existence. 



I have kept in captivity nearly half of our British 

 species of ants, and at the present moment have in my 

 room more than thirty nests, belonging to about twenty 

 species ; some of which, however, are not English. No 

 two species are identical in habits ; and, on various 

 accounts, their mode of life is far from easy to unravel. 

 In the first place, most of their time is passed under- 

 ground : all the education of the young, for instance, 



