pense, which may be employed more use- tice-masters, one of whom was an enthufully; that this diversion endangers the siastic reader of Homer, and had diffused children's taking cold by standing, and | Homeric admiration among all the boys. prevents their exercise, which is neces"We were,' ," said Howitt, "Greek and sary for their health." Finding that idle- Trojan mad, and, of course, we divided ness was the mother of mischief, the our two bands in this game into Greeks committee thought they had found a rem- and Trojans. We tucked up our coat-laps edy in providing George Fox's journal under our coats, and buttoned our coats and similar works for the use of the boys up so as to resemble close jackets, prein their leisure. As might have been ex-senting as little as possible for anybody pected, the boys cared as little for such reading as modern boys would.

A wall surrounded the estate, out of which there was no escape. The com mittee had so little knowledge of human nature that they thought they would exclude evil influences.

to get hold of, and it may be imagined with what ardor we played, till we were all as hot as Achilles ever was himself when before the walls of Troy. Many a good coat and shirt-collar have I seen wrenched away in one pull at that favor. ite game." With equal enthusiasm he describes the part he took in the work of the farm, which had not fewer than three hundred and fifty people to support.

The list of offences and the punish

The rooms were fifty feet in length and nearly twenty in width, and as there was only one fire in each, in winter, and all the floors were of stone, the condition of the children may be imagined. In 1810, how-ments to be awarded is a curious docuever, or thirty years after the school had ment. It is entitled "Observations on been established, the committee adopted Punishment," and opens with this explasteam-pipes; but not until ten years after nation, which we copy verbatim for the did they turn their attention to warming benefit of modern teachers: "Punishtheir meeting-house. To make that com- ment is intended as a restraint on evil, fortable and cheerful never occurred to and should be inflicted with coolness and them, and we can, with the historian of resolution without the least appearance the school, well believe that in those long, of passion, for when passion is discovsolemn, and often silent services of the ered there is reason to believe that reweek, the thinly-clad and shivering little venge has had some share in the punishboys and girls had a good deal of leisurement, and that the master is not influenced for reflecting on their miseries.

Notwithstanding hard fare and somewhat harsh treatment, William Howitt described his school-days as delightful, "helping each other with our gardens, reading, conversing, and joining in all the active sports of the school." There was, he said, a famous troop of lads to engage in any play, and he had often seen the whole number making one long line at leapfrog, or busy at prison-bars, or runacross, making a clamor and a hum that was heard a mile off. That run-across he described as a grand play. Across the middle of the green ran a paved walk; under the windows of the boys' diningroom was another; the space between these was occupied by one-half the boys at play, whose business was to seize any of the others who attempted to run across. If the runners got across to the pavement under the windows they were safe; if they were caught and detained while the captor counted ten, they were prisoners, and were on parole under the dining-room until any other of their party running across could touch them, which gave them a right to run back again. In these sports they were joined by the appren

by a sincere concern for the welfare of his scholar. The less severe punishment is the better, provided the end is answered; but in some cases it should be more severe than in others." The document then describes the punishment to be awarded for each offence. 'Telling a wilful lie, taking God's name in vain, swearing, stealing, and other gross immoralities, may be punished with the rod, which, whenever used, should be done with much solemnity." Although fighting regular pitched battles was considered a grave offence, it was not considered as bad as lying or swearing, for it was ordered that the offender should be " punished in a less degree than the former immoralities." Very literal was the reading of Solomon's advice about the rod, in the early days of the school. But from the first, corporal punishment could not be inflicted without the consent of all the masters, who held weekly courts. A modification of this regulation was, however, made, which provided that in cases of disobedience to a master's authority, the master might at once call in the aid of two of his fellow-teachers, who with himself might jointly decide on the amount

the summit of great round-headed lads, | them would never have had any educaready to fall off at the first move, and tion at all. Among the scholars may be great ones dropping over the noses of little ones.

For forty years after the opening of the school the instruction did not extend beyond the three R's. The attention of the boys was concentrated upon a few subjects instead of being frittered away upon many. To make good writers and readers was the ambition of the committee. Reading, however, seems to have been the pet subject, but, from the absence of suitable books, was taught under difficulties. Frequent complaints of the nonexistence of books adapted to the capacity of children appear in the minutes of the committee, who were compelled to fall back upon the journals of Friends, and the less easily understood “ "beauties of a ponderous German philosopher. More attractive reading was supplied in Goldsmith's "History of England," William Penn's "Travels through Holland and Germany," and Sewell's history. Another characteristic piece of Quaker literature offered to the juveniles was the narrative of Thomas Lurting, who from a fighting sailor turned peaceable Christian, and exhibited his friendly principles even to the Algerian pirates who had captured the ship in which he was engaged, and on whom he turned the tables by making them prisoners without shedding of blood or the striking of a blow.

mentioned John Bright; the late Mr. Henry Ashworth, of Bolton, foremost in the Anti-Corn-Law agitation; William Howitt; the Right Hon. James Wilson, who was financial secretary for India, and the founder of the Economist; Mr. Jeremiah Holmes Wiffen, the translator of Tasso's "Jerusalem Delivered," and the author of "Historical Memoirs of the House of Russell;" Benjamin B. Wiffen, author of the "History of the Early Spanish Protestant Reformers; " Dr. Miller, F.R.S., author of the "Elements of Chemistry; " Mr. John Gilbert Baker, F.R.S., the well-known botanist; and Mrs. Ellis, author of "Women of England."

AMERICAN ANTS.*

From Nature.

LOOKING to the extensive and systematic work which Dr. McCook has already accomplished in the study of some of the most interesting species of New World ants, we are exceedingly glad to observe from this additional volume that he has now turned his serious attention to the honey-ants, for, although the habits of this species were known to be certainly among the most remarkable of the many remarkable habits that are presented by the Hymenoptera, they have not hitherto engaged the study of any competent_observer. As he himself observes, "Very little of their habits has heretofore been known, and only the forms of the honeybearer and worker-major. In order, if possible, to remove this reproach from entomology, I started in the early part of July, A.D. 1879, for New Mexico."

The institute was "managed" by two committees, the one sitting in London and the other at Ackworth. As might have been expected, there were frequent conflicts of opinion between them, and when the London committee advised the introduction of Mrs. Barbauld's "Hymns" and the "Catechism of Nature," the Ackworth committee rejected them as unsuitable, and adopted the "Rational Dame." But brighter days dawned before the cen- In giving a short abstract of the results tury closed, and Lindley Murray's "En- which have rewarded his energy, we may glish Reader" proved an inestimable best begin by describing the forms or Boon to the school. Other school-books "castes" which Dr. McCook found to were added from time to time, and a more constitute a colony of honey-ants. There comprehensive system of education has are (1) three castes of workers, namely, been gradually introduced. Taking the major, minor, and minim or dwarf-the school as a whole it is believed to have first being 8.5 mm. in length, the second been in advance of middle-class schools 7 mm., and the third 5.5 mm.; (2) honey. both in education and training. It is ad-bearers, “a sedentary class or caste dismitted that the treatment was Spartan; tinguished by abdomens distended into a and some of the friends of the school contend that the failings of the committee were those of the age in which they lived, and sprang out of prevailing currents of thought.

The school has educated about ten thousand children, and but for it many of

spherical form of expansion of the crop filled with grape-sugar; the length (including abdomen) is 13 mm. (one-half

The Honey-Ants of the Garden of the Gods, and C. McCook, D.D. Philadelphia: Lippincott and Co., the Occident Ants of the American Plains. By Henry 1882.

inch); the proportions and description of other species, maintain. The author sugthe head and body are those of the worker-gests, and not improbably, that this for. major, of which it may be a developed bearance on the part of the workers may form;" (3) female, or queen-length 13 mm.; (4) male-length 5 mm.

be explained as "the result of an instinctive sentiment by which nature guaranRegarding the economy of the hive, the tees protection to the living honey-bearer." first important point established by Dr. The partly-filled rotunds are not wholly McCook's observations is that the honey-dependent for their food upon the gorgbearers do not, as has been asserted, ing process to which they are submitted themselves elaborate the honey, but that by the workers, for when only partly filled, this is gathered by the workers from a they will feed themselves on sugar; but peculiar kind of vegetable gall, and by the author never saw "a honey-bearer of them poured into the crop or proventricu- full rotundity taking food or drink." But lus of the honey-bearers; the honey-bear- the fact that before this insect is largely ers are therefore nothing more than living distended with honey it will feed itself store-houses for the food of the hive, their points to the supposition that it may be relation to the rest of the community be- itself a worker, slightly, if at all modified ing, as Dr. McCook observes, similar to in structure; and this supposition is that of the honey-comb cells to the hive borne out by anatomical investigation. bee. For not only do the worker-ants For the latter has shown: (1) “that it is store the "rotunds," but when they re- the crop alone which contains the nectar quire food they go to the rotunds, which received at the mouth; (2) "that the feed them by pressing out a drop of their organs of the abdominal portion of the store from the esophagus. Likewise alimentary canal are ordinarily in a nat"the queen, virgin females, males, and ural state, except in so far as their posithe teeming nursery of white grubs" are tion has been changed by the downward all dependent on the rotunds for nourish- and backward pressure of the expanding ment. The honey is collected from the crop;" and (3)" that the process by which galls by the workers at night, the insects the rotundity of the honey-bearers has being very intolerant of sunlight, and probably been produced has its exact quickly dying when exposed to it. The counterpart in the ordinary distension honey pressed from the body of the rotunds has a pleasant taste, somewhat resembling ordinary honey, but more aromatic, slightly acid, and contains a larger proportion of water being, therefore, more limpid. It requires about one thou sand honey-bearers to yield one pound weight (troy) of honey. Dr. Wetherill says, as the result of analysis, that the substance is "a nearly pure solution of grape-sugar which is in a state of hy dration isomeric with grape-sugar, and differing from grape-sugar in not crystallizing."

of the crop in over-fed ants; that at least the condition of the alimentary canal in all the castes is the same, differing only in degree, and therefore the proba bility is very great that the honey-bearer is simply a worker with an overgrown abdomen." Why the extraordinarily distended crop seen in the honey-ant should be limited to two species (so far as known), and why so limited a number of workers in the formicaries of these two species should develop the round abdomen, are questions that provide sufficient wonder, but yield scant satisfaction."

pletion. In the comparative scale of representation adopted, the empty crop is drawn about the size of a pea, and the fully distended one about that of a tennisball.

The working ants are so fond of the The degree of distension which the honey stored within the rotunds, that crop of fully gorged rotund undergoes is when, in making sections of the nests, certainly most surprising. Among the Dr. McCook ruptured the abdomens of thirteen plates with which Dr. McCook's the rotunds, he always observed that, work is illustrated, several figures are "notwithstanding the high state of ex-given of the crop in various stages of re⚫citement which pervaded the colony, the ordinary instinct to defend the nest and preserve the larvæ, cocoons, and other dependents, was at once suspended in the presence of the delicious temptation." It is therefore the more remarkable that Regarding less special points of interwhen a rotund dies the workers do not est, we may notice the "absence of indiopen the abdomen to get at the contained vidual beneficence." Not a single instance honey, but, after severing the abdomen of such beneficence was noticed, although from the thorax, remove each part sepa- closely watched for, while the exhibitions rately to a "cemetery," or common bury- of an apparently cruel neglect were many. ing-ground which these ants, like many | Thus, "the grains of sand and soil were

heaped around the rotunds, until the poor | character, and also gather leaves and creatures were literally buried alive. It flowers which they deposit in the middle would have been easy for the busy masons of their fortress, leaving them to be then to draw their fellows aside and thus carry conveyed by ants of a second species to on their work. But it either never oc- the honey-bearers as food. The remarkcurred to them to do so, or the disposi-able fortress was described as being tion was wanting." This, however, applies formed in the shape of a perfect square, to the case when the ants are engaged in having one side open and always facing making a new nest, after having been due south, while round the remaining transferred en masse by the author to three sides the ants of the larger species hitherto unbroken ground. But "in the were described as perpetually parading in natural sites the workers showed great a double line of defence. None of these interest in the preservation of the rotunds, assertions have been corroborated by Dr. dealing with them very much as with the McCook, and therefore he may be exlarvæ." In these natural sites the ro- cused for suggesting that Capt. Fleeson tunds hang suspended by their claws, may perhaps have been " testing the backs downwards, from the roof of their credulity of the writer by one of those underground chamber, and if they fall to jokes of which naturalists are occasionthe floor they are unable to move from ally the victims." "But," he adds, "if the spot on account of their unwieldy the narrative is to be taken in good faith, mass. In such a case several workers I can only explain the facts by supposing "would join in removing one rotund, push- that the observer happened upon a nest ing and pulling her along. Another of cutting ants (Atta fervens) within sketch represents a worker-major drag- whose boundaries a nest of Melliger had ging a rotund honey-bearer up the per- chanced to be established, and had conpendicular face of a cutting made in the founded the habits of the two as those of excavation of the nest. The mandibles one formicary; or, second, that the cutting of the two insects were interlocked, and ants, or some other species of a similar the worker backed up the steep, success- economy, have really acquired the habit of fully drawing her protégée." It seems, kidnapping and domesticating the honeyhowever, to have been undetermined ant for the sake of its treasured sweets, whether in such a case the worker re- precisely as many ants domesticate stores the rotund to her place on the roof aphides." "The porterage of leaves, etc., of the chamber; it is certain that they into nests is not an uncommon habit did not do so in the author's artificial for- among ants of divers species; therefore, micaries, for although the fallen rotunds without stopping to discuss the question were faithfully attended, often cleansed whether such material may contribute to and caressed, in no single instance did the food supply of the formicary, it may the workers attempt to right them and be remarked that its most probable and restore them to the roof." ordinary use is for purposes of architecture or nest-building."

It will be seen from this brief epitome of Dr. McCook's results that, while add- After again reading the account as pubing a number of new facts, they partly lished by Mr. Edwards, we cannot enterconfirm, and partly contradict the previ- tain the suggestion that he has been the ously published statements of Llane (1832) | victim of an intentional hoax. But as the and Wesmael (1838). But, as Dr. Mc- suggestion has been made by an honest Cook himself observes, "One of the and independent observer, we feel it to be most perplexing accounts of the honey- incumbent on those who were responsible ant is that of Mr. Henry Edwards," who for the publication of the account to repu recorded the statements from a verbal diate the insinuation of dishonesty; and, description given to him by Capt. W. B. looking to the definite nature of the stateFleeson, whose observations were made ments which that account contained, we at or near Santa Fè. This description was feel it is now more desirable than ever first published in the " Proceedings " of that they should be either verified or disthe California Academy of Sciences, (vol. proved by some competent naturalist visv., p. 72, 1873), and afterwards in the col-iting the locality where the observations umns of this journal. Its chief points are said to have been made. were that the honey-bearing ants are suspended to the roof of this chamber by meshes of web, that there are three very distinct castes, if not species and genera of ants forming a colony, that the larger kind form a fortress of a most remarkable

The second part of Dr. McCook's vol. ume treats of the Occident ants of the American Plains. These build mounds from less than half a foot to more than a foot in height, round which they make a circular "clearing" of grass and other.