AN INTERESTING EXHIBIT.

Waikato Times, Volume XXXIX, Issue 3178, 5 November 1892, Page 2 (Supplement)

AN INTERESTING EXHIBIT.

At the Western Gardens in Eavl's-court, nenr London, there is what, from n scientific point of view, is perhap3 a most novel feature. This a display of working ants arranged by the librarian of the Fulbam Free "Library. It comprises actual specimens at work of what moat people have only heard of—slave-hunters, slaves garden ants, and great hill ants, who are so muc'u sit home that iu the course of a few weeks they have raised their nest from sin. to 9in. On cuiiny aftercoons the industrious workers bring out their winged males and take theih for a promenade round the dome. _ For when the sun's rays strike the village they "knock off* for a time and play. About five o'clock the feebler eex are taken back into the nest by the workers, and most of the doors are closed, the working ants again commencing their building. The nest itself is a really remarkable structure, beams in the shape of pine-needles Gia. long and ten times heavier than the ants themselves forming part of the dome. Nor are sanitary regulations neglected, for, in a far corner of the vivarium is to be seen a dust heap, on which the ants deposit th*; empty cocoon cases. Dignity above all is consulted in the bnsy patriarchal community where society ie ordered upon a principle which obtained before equality and the rights of anybody were invented. For, while the lazy lords of their little creation bask in the sun, and the slaves moil and toil, the queen lies secluded in her chamber at the bottom of the nest never for a moment making her obeisance to such of the public as care to watch this really remarkable display. There is an ant cemetery also. VVhen any of tho workers die, the corpse is carried out-side the little city, past tho sentry at the gate, and laid as far away from the living chambers as possible, in a little walled enclosure, the ants simply removing a portion of the fence on occasion the of an interment.