88 
A Living Honeycomb. 
[February, 
v pw Mexico but he discovered them in Colorado, inhabiting 
fhe locali ty known as the “ Garden of the Gods,” then- nests 
being excavated in the stony crests of low ridges which run 
through this mountain-girt Paradise. 
The ridges are composed of a friable sandstone, into which 
our minute masons mine deeply, digging galleries which 
sometimes run for several feet into the rock The nest 
outwardly, is some io inches in diameter fr0I T 2 t0 
,1 inches in height, composed of sand and bits of stone 
carried from within, some of which seem large enough to 
defy a regiment of ants to move them. 
Inside the nests successive chambers are excavated, con- 
nected by galleries, the floors of the chambers being compa- 
ratively smooth, while the ceilings are left in a rough state 
But this roughness is no evidence of carelessness in the 
builder It has, on the contrary, an important objedt : this 
is to furnish foothold for the clinging feet of certain extra- 
ordinary-looking creatures, which form the living honey- 
combs of which we have spoken. 
Fancy an animal with the head and thorax of a small 
ant hut with all the posterior portion of the body converted 
into a round sac, of the size of a large pea, and of aiich 
translucent amber hue,— it being, in fadt, distended into a 
reservoir of honey. This honey-bag is immense when com- 
pared with the size of the ant, the unchanged parts of which 
might pass for a black pin’s head attached to the side of a 
marrowfat pea. These odd-looking creatures cling to the 
roof of the chamber with their feet, the distended honey-bag 
hanging downwards like an amber globe. On seeing them 
we instinctively imagine that their leg-muscles must be de 
veloped in a fashion to put to shame those of hurnan 
athletes, since it is no light weight which they are thus 
forced to continuously support. ... . 
In each chamber of the nest about thirty honey-hearers 
are found, making some three hundred to the complete nest. 
Besides these there are hundreds or thousands of others, 
workers and soldiers, lords and queens, to whom the honey- 
bearers serve as storehouses of winter food. , 
Dr M‘Cook succeeded in bringing some of these home 
with him alive, providing them wth nest-buildmg materials 
and with sugar for nutriment. He has one very interesting 
nest in a glass bottle, with its interior chamber well dis- 
played The roof of this is covered with depending globules 
of honey, so large as almost to conceal the minute clinging 
insedt of which they really form part. , 
But the marvellous feature of the case yet remains to be 
