84 CUKIOUS HOMES AND THEIR TENANTS. 



iceable tools devised, or ones that could be put to a 

 greater number of uses ; for with them their owners 

 dig, carve, saw, bore, pinch, carry and fight, and 

 when used for each of these various purposes they 

 seem as if designed for that particular end, and for _ 

 no other. 



HONEY ANTS AND THEIR HOMES. 



LIVING HONEY BOTTLES. 



Honey ants are small red insects, and are found 

 throughout Mexico, Texas, and as far north as Colo- 

 rado. Their nests are large, rounded mounds, or in 

 some cases low heaps, extending over an area of per- 

 haps twenty or thirty square feet. The ants, as a 

 rule, nocturnal, working all night and sometimes by 

 day, for they appear to be the most active and indus- 

 trious of insects, even among races proverbial for 

 industry ; indeed, they seem to have no season of 

 rest. 



Of all the household utensils used by living crea- 

 tures, the oddest, without doubt, are the living bottles 

 of the honey ant. The insects, as their name implies, 

 live upon honey, or sweet, sirupy fluid from plants ; 

 but although ants are intelligent enough as builders, ' 

 and shepherds or cattle-keepers, and as farmers, they 

 have never learned from their cousins the bees to 

 make vessels in which liquid can be stored, and the 

 question arises how their food is to be kept after it is 



