HONEY-MAKINa ANTS. 
Ill 
insects collect from the ground beneath, and work into 
the form of thin scales. These are then built together in 
an imbricated manner, like tiles or slates upon the roof of a 
house, the upper or outer scale, however, being one un- 
broken sheet, which covers the whole nest like a skull-cap. 
Below this the scales are placed one upon another in a 
wavy or scalloped manner, so that numerous little arched 
entrances are left, and yet, owing to the imbricated 
manner in which the scales are arranged, the interior of 
the nest is perfectly protected from rain. This interior 
consists of a number of irregular cells, the walls of which 
are formed by the same process as the exterior. 
In New South Wales there is another species of ant 
which also frequents trees, but builds within the stem and 
branches. In the report of Captain Cook’s expedition its 
habits are thus described: — 6 Their habitations are the 
insides of the branches of a tree, which they contrive to 
excavate, by working out the pith almost to the extremity 
of the slenderest twig ; the tree at the same time flourish- 
ing as if it had no such inmate.’ On breaking one of the 
branches the ants swarm out in legions. Some of our 
native species also have the habit of excavating the in- 
terior of trees, though not on so extensive a scale. 
Honey-making Ant (Myrmecocystus mexicanus). — 
This ant is found in Texas and New Mexico. Capt. W. 
B. Fleeson has observed its habits, and his observations 
have been communicated to the Californian Academy of 
Sciences, and also, by Mr. Henry Edwards, to Mr. Darwin. 
The following are the chief points of interest in Capt. 
Fleeson’s results : — 
The community appears to consist of three distinct kinds of 
ants, probably of two separate genera, whose offices in the 
general order of the nest would seem to be entirely apart from 
each other, and who perform the labour allotted to them with- 
out the least encroachment upon the duties of their fellows. 
These tluee kinds are — 
I. Yellow workers ; nurses and feeders of II. 
II. Yellow honey-makers ; sole function to secrete a kind of 
honey in their large globose abdomens, on which the 
other ants are supposed to feed. They never quit 
the nest, and are fed and tended by L 
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