PERFECT SOCIETIES OF INSECTS. 



83 



After their annual labours are begun, few are ignorant 

 how incessantly ants are engaged in building or repairing 

 their habitations, in collecting provisions, and in the care of 

 their young brood ; but scarcely any are aware of the extent 

 to which their activity is carried, and that their labours are 

 going on even in the night. Yet this is a certain fact. 

 Long ago Aristotle affirmed that ants worked in the night 

 when the moon was at the full ] : and their historian Gould 

 observes, " that they even exceed the painful industrious 

 bees. For the ants employ each moment, by day and night, 

 almost without intermission, unless hindered by excessive 

 rains." 2 M. Huber also, speaking of a mason-ant, not found 

 with us, tells us that they work after sunset, and in the 

 night. 3 To these I can add some observations of my own, 

 which fully confirm these accounts. My first were made at 

 nine o'clock at night, when I found the inhabitants of a nest 

 of the red ant {Myrmica rubra) very busily employed ; I re- 

 peated the observation, which I could conveniently do, the 

 nest being in my garden, at various times from that hour till 

 twelve, and always found some going and coming, even while 

 a heavy rain was falling. Having in the day noticed some 

 Aphides upon a thistle, I examined it again in the night, at 

 about eleven o'clock, and found my ants busy milking their 

 cows, which did not for the sake of repose intermit their 

 suction. At the same hour another night, I observed the 

 little negro-ant (F. fused) engaged in the same employment 

 upon an elder. About two miles from my residence was a 

 nest of Gould's hill-ant (jF. rufa), which, according to M. 

 Huber, shut their gates, or rather barricade them, every 

 night, and remain at home. 4 Being desirous of ascertaining 

 the accuracy of his statement, early in October, about two 

 o'clock one morning, I visited this nest in company with 

 an intelligent friend ; and to our surprise and admiration we 

 found our ants at work, some being engaged in carrying their 

 usual burden, sticks and straws, into their habitation, others 

 going out from it, and several were climbing the neighbouring 

 oaks, doubtless to milk their Aphides. The number of comers 



1 Hist. Animal. 1. ix. c. 38. 

 3 Huber, 35. 42. 



a 2 



2 Gould, 68. 

 4 Huber, 23. 



