HONEY-MAKING ANT OF TEXAS AND NEW MEXICO. 423 
every fact connected with its economy becomes a matter of con- 
siderable scientific importance, and the following observations, 
gleaned from Capt. W. B. Fleeson of this city, who has recently 
had an opportunity of studying the ants in their native haunts, 
may, it is hoped, be not without interest. 
The community appears to consist of three distinct kinds of 
ants, whose offices in the general order of the nest would seem 
to be entirely apart from each other, and who perform the labor 
allotted to them without the least encroachment upon the duties 
of their fellows. The larger number of individuals consists of 
yellow worker ants of two kinds, one of which, of a pale golden 
yellow color, about one-third of an inch in length, act as nurses 
and feeders of the honey-making kind, who do not quit the inte- 
rior of the nest, “their sole purpose being, apparently, to elabo- 
rate a kind of honey, which they are said to discharge into 
prepared receptacles, and which constitutes the food of the entire 
population. In these honey-secreting workers the abdomen is 
distended into a large, globose, bladder-like form, about the size 
of a pea.” The third variety of ant is much larger, black in color 
and with very formidable mandibles. For the purpose of better un- 
derstanding the doings of this community, we will designate them 
as follows: : 
No. 1— Yellow workers ; nurses and feeders. 
No. 2— Yellow workers ; honey makers. 
No. 3 — Black workers ; guards and purveyors. 
The site chosen for the nest is usually some sandy soil in the 
neighborhood of shrubs and flowers, and the space occupied is 
about from four to five feet square. Unlike the nests of most 
other ants, however, the surface of the soil is usually undisturbed, 
and, but for the presence of the insects themselves, presents a 
very different appearance from the ordinary communities, the 
ground having been subjected to no disturbance, and not pulver- 
ized and rendered loose as in the case with the majority of species. 
The black workers (No. 3) surround the nest as guards or senti- 
nels, and are always in a state of great activity. They form two 
lines of defence, moving different ways, their march always being 
along three sides of a square, one column moving from the south- 
east to the southwest corner of the fortification, while the other 
: proceeds in the opposite direction. In most of the nests examined 
by Captain Fleeson, the direction of the nest was usually towards 
