ISO 



NATURAL SCIENCE NEWS. 



the two species at this period of 

 their existence. Remembering, at 

 the time the above remarks con- 

 cerning the South American spe- 

 cies, we looked carefully for the 

 workers, in this instance and fail- 

 ed to discover above half a dozen 

 wingless ants above ground, and 

 these were plodding about, very 

 indifferent,, as it appeared to us, to 

 the fate or welfare of their winged 

 brothers. And on digging down a 

 few inches, we could find but com- 

 paratively few individuals in the 

 nest, and could detect no move- 

 ments on their parts that referred 

 to the exodus of winged individ- 

 uals, then going on. 



"On the other hand, the time of 

 day agrees with the remarks of Mr. 

 Bates. When we first noticed 

 them, about 4 p. m., they had 

 probably just commenced their 

 night. It continued until nearly 

 7 p. m., or a considerable time af- 

 ter sundown. The next morning, 

 there was not an individual, wing- 

 ed or wingless, to be seen above 

 ground; the nest itself was com- 

 paratively empty; and what few oc- 

 cupants there were seemed to be 

 in a semi-torpid condition. Were 

 they simply resting after the fa- 

 tigue and excitement of yesterday? 



"It was not possible for us to 

 calculate what proportion of these 

 winged ants were carried by the 

 wind too far to return to their old 

 home; but certainly a large pro- 

 portion were caught by the sur- 

 rounding trees; and we found, on 

 search, some of these crawling 

 down the trunks of the trees, with 

 their wings in a damaged condi- 

 tion. How near the trees, must 

 be for them to reach their, old 

 home, we should like to learn; and 

 what tells them, 'which road to 

 take? Dr. Duncan states, * 'It 

 was formerly supposed that the fe- 

 males which alighted at a great dis- 

 tance from their old nests returned 

 again, but Huber, having great 

 doubts upon this subject, found 

 that some of them, after having 

 left the males, fell on to the ground 

 in out'of-the-way places, wdience 

 they could not possibly return to 

 the original nest!' We unfortu- 

 nately did not note the sex of 

 those individuals that we intercept- 

 ed in their return (?) trip; but we 

 can not help expressing our belief 

 that, at least in this case, there 

 was scarcely an appreciable amount 

 of 'returning' on the part of those 

 whose exodus we have just describ- 

 ed; although so many were caught 

 by the nearer trees and shrubbery. 

 Is it probable that these insects 



* Transformations of Insects, p. 205. 



could find their way to a small un- 

 derground nest, where there was 

 no 'travel' in the vicinity, other 

 than the steady departure of indi- 

 viduals, who, like themselves, were 

 terribly bothered with the wings 

 they were carrying about with 

 them?" {American A T afuralis1). 



Insects Which are Man's 

 Friends. 



The lady bug, so quaintly- 

 marked that it is hard to find two 

 of them just alike, is one of the 

 gardener's best friends, yet hun- 

 dreds of them are killed because 

 people, in their ignorance, don't 

 know what a helper they have in 

 this pretty, buxom little insect. A 

 few days ago a writer in the New 

 York Tribune visited a friend who 

 has a garden full of all sorts of 

 flowers, and back of these there is 

 a kitchen garden, with rows of 

 currants and raspberry bushes. 

 The leaves of both these shrubs 

 were covered with blight or lice 

 that were as green as the leaves on 

 which they lived and thrived. 

 Hunting about the bushes were a 

 number of lady r bugs. The woman 

 in her ignorance was killing these 

 right and left, thinking they were 

 doing all the damage, and when 

 tc4d they were her best friends was 

 incredulous. A few minutes care- 

 ful watching, however, showed the 

 small bug busy eating the smaller 

 green pest. Small yellow pyra- 

 mids showed where she had laid 

 her eggs, which in a day or two 

 would hatch. The woman saw 

 and believed, and in future the 

 the lady bug has a sure refuge and 

 a welcome in her patch of flowers 

 and fruit. 



Another insect that is forever 

 being killed, owing to the ignor- 

 ance of the general public is the 

 dragon fly, also known as the nee- 

 dlecase. He is one of the most 

 useful insects of this climate. In 

 his larval state he subsists almost 

 entirely on those small squirming 

 threads which can be seen darting 

 about in any still water, and which 

 hatch out into the sweet singing 

 mosquito. As soon as the dragon 

 fly leaves his watery nursing 

 ground, and, climbing some friend- 

 ly reed, throws away the old shell 

 and flies away, he is helping man 

 again. His quarry now is the 

 house fly. Not long ago the writer 

 saw one of these insects knocked 

 down in a veranda, where he had 

 been doing yeoman's service, and 

 the children and women seemed 

 delighted, although they shrank 



back from the poor wounded drag- 

 on fly. They all thought he had 

 an awful sting at the end of his 

 long body — a cruel injustice. 

 When the writer took the insect up 

 there was general wonderment, 

 which was increased when a cap- 

 tured fly was offered him and" he 

 ate it greedily. The boys of that 

 household will never harm a drag- 

 on fly again. — Scientific American. 



Fascination by Snakes. 



No error is apparently more 

 rooted in the human mind than 

 that which attributes to snakes a 

 peculiar power called "fascina- 

 tion," which they are believed to 

 be capable of voluntarily exercis- 

 ing. By this power they are said 

 to be able so to paralyze their vic- 

 tims that they are rendered utterly 

 incapable of movement, and wait 

 for the attack of a snake, or even 

 go forward to meet it, in fear and 

 trembling, but without any power 

 of retaliation. Now any one who 

 watches the behavior of small ani- 

 mals placed alive as food in the 

 cages in which snakes are kept in 

 captivity, in the hope of seeing 

 this marvelous power in operation, 

 will be greviously disappointed; 

 chickens, rats, guinea pigs, rab- 

 bits, all move about with an utter 

 absence of fear of snakes. It may 

 be said that all these are more or 

 less domesticated animals, and 

 have no hereditary dread of their 

 natural enemy; but wild rats, plac- 

 ed in the cage of their particular 

 pursuer, the rat snake of India 

 {Zamcnis miiscosus), exhibit an ab- 

 sense of fear. 



How, then, is it possible to ac- 

 count for the existence of the be- 

 lief in the possession by snakes of 

 the so-called power of fascination? 

 It may have arisen from several 

 causes. An observer may come 

 on the scene and find a number of 

 birds mobbing a snake just as they 

 will mob an owl or kite. The 

 dashes of the birds toward the 

 snake and their fluttering round it 

 may easily be put down to the ef- 

 fect of the snake's glance, while 

 they are, in reality, merely the at- 

 tempts of the birds to drive off the 

 intruder. A mother bird whose 

 young are attacke d will almost cer- 

 tainly behave in this way, and may 

 herself fall a victim, not to the 

 power of fascination in the snake, 

 but to the force of her maternal 

 feelings. Then again it has been 

 noticed that a hen placed in a 

 snake's cage will often go toward 

 it and make a determined peck at 



