i88 
THE BEAUTIFUL LAD DEE. 
hands, watching the curious activities of an ant- 
colony, these insects have been special objects 
of wonder and delightful study. Year by year 
some new and deeply-interesting fact was add¬ 
ed to the stock of knowledge respecting their 
strange habits. Thus it has been ascertained 
that they build houses, make slaves, keep cows, 
fight battles, conquer adverse kingdoms, live in 
the fiercest heats possible for animal life, are 
frozen into cakes of ice, and come forth when 
thawed with unchecked vitality, and show many 
other marvellous phases of life. For a time it 
was thought that the sum-total of their history 
had been completed; but no, it was a very grave 
mistake, as the following sketch, published in a 
late number of the Journal of Science, v^\\\ prove. 
The writer says: 
“ ‘ Among the Hynienoptera the lead is un¬ 
doubtedly taken by the ants, which, like men, 
have a brain much more highly developed than 
that of the neighboring inferior groups. Per¬ 
haps the most elevated of the Forinicide family 
is the agricultural ant of Western Texas. This 
species is, save man, the only creature which 
does not depend for its sustenance on the prod¬ 
ucts of the chase or the spontaneous fruits of 
