ANTS
“Ants live in communities, each containing many members, in underground
abodes, where the young are reared. These communities are composed of
three kinds of insects: males and females, recognizable by their large
transparent wings, four to each ant; and the neuters, or workers, which
have no wings. These last, the workers, build the house, take care of
the community, rear the larvæ and bring them their food, distributing
it to each one. The others do not work. To add to the population by
furnishing an abundant supply of eggs is all that they are expected to
do.
“As soon as the rays of the morning sun strike the ant-hill, the
workers standing watch at the entrance hasten within, nudge their
comrades with their antennæ to wake them up, run from one to another,
urge them on, hustle them into activity, and put all the subterranean
galleries into lively commotion. First of all, attention must be given
to the larvæ, feeble transparent worms, without feet and unable to feed
themselves and to grow unless they receive assiduous care from their
nurses.
“Accordingly, aroused by the tumult caused by the workers rushing in
from outside, the ants proceed to busy themselves with the larvæ and
also with the nymphs, carrying them with all possible expedition into
the open air and placing them where they will best be exposed for some
time to the benign influence of the sun’s heat. After this sun-bath
they are returned to the darkness and stowed away in chambers expressly
prepared for them. And now is the time for feeding the nurslings.
“Just as little birds receive the beakful of food, so do the larvæ take
their nourishment. When they are hungry they raise themselves a little
and seek the mouth of some one of the workers engaged in ministering to
them. The nursing ant opens its mandibles and lets a tiny drop of
sweetened liquid be taken from its mouth. Thus, one suck at a time, the
nutritive juice is distributed until the entire brood is fed.
“But carrying the larvæ into the sun and feeding them will not suffice:
they must also be kept in a state of extreme cleanliness. The workers
bestow upon their charges the same tender care that the mother cat
exercises toward her kittens. Over and over again they lick the
nursling’s body to give it perfect whiteness, and they tug cautiously
at the wrinkled skin when the transformation draws near.
“Before casting this skin the larva spins itself a cocoon of silk,
elongated and cylindrical in shape, pale yellow in color, very smooth,
and compact in texture. Under cover of this protecting sac, the worm
becomes a nymph. In this form the ant assumes its final shape, lacking
only strength and a little firmness. All its members are distinct, but
enveloped in a fine membrane which it must strip off to become a
perfect insect.
“If you disturb an ant-hill you will see the workers hastening to carry
away and put in a safe place certain cylindrical bodies having somewhat
the appearance of grains of wheat and very inappropriately called
ant-eggs. They are not the eggs of the insect, which are in reality
much smaller; they are cocoons with their contents, larvæ at first,
nymphs later.
“When the time comes for leaving its cocoon, the enclosed ant is unable
of itself to gain its freedom by piercing with its mandibles the silken
envelope; it possesses nothing resembling the solvent liquid which the
silk-worm holds in reserve in its stomach; nor has it at the forward
end of its prison-cell a door for exit analogous to the curious paling
provided for the great peacock-butterfly. It would perish in its silk
sack if the working ants did not bestir themselves for its deliverance.
“Three or four of these mount the cocoon and strive to open it at the
end corresponding to the prisoner’s head. They begin by weakening the
texture of the sac by tearing away a few threads of silk at the point
where the opening is to be made; then, nipping and twisting the tissue
so difficult to break through, they at last succeed in puncturing it
with a number of holes near one another, whereupon the mandibles are
applied at one of these holes just as one would apply a pair of
scissors, and a narrow strip is cut away. At this hard labor the ants
work in relays, toiling and resting by turn. One holds the narrow strip
that has been cut, while a second enlarges the opening, and a third
gently extricates the young ant from its natal sac.
“At last the insect comes forth, but unable to walk or even to stand on
its legs, for it is still enswathed in a final membrane which it cannot
strip off unaided. The workers do not forsake it in this new
predicament; they free it from the satin envelope enwrapping all its
members; with delicate care they extricate the antennæ from their
sheaths; they disengage the feet and set the body at liberty. Then the
young ant is in a condition to walk about and, above all, to take
nourishment, which it greatly needs after all this fatiguing exertion.
Its liberators vie with one another in offering the mouth and
disgorging a little sweetened liquid. For some days longer the workers
keep a watchful eye on their new companions and follow them about,
acquainting them with the labyrinthine passages of their abode. Thus
instructed, the young ants mingle with the others and share their
labors.
“The nurses remaining at home to perform the household duties depend
for their rations on the workers that go out to collect supplies. These
latter bring them little insects, or pieces of those that they have
dismembered on the spot when the entire prey is too large for
conveyance. Whatever they may be, these provisions are passed around
and are speedily disposed of by the assembled company. If the working
ants chance to find ripe fruit or large pieces of game that cannot be
divided into small parts, they adopt another mode of procedure. Placed
in possession of so great riches, they content themselves with the
juice alone, of which they imbibe copiously, then return home with
stomachs full of liquid food which they disgorge, drop by drop, as fast
as their hungry comrades present themselves.
“The ant in need of nourishment strikes rapidly with its antennæ those
of the ant expected to render the desired assistance. Presently they
are seen to approach each other with open mouths and tongues out in
readiness for the transfer of the nutritive liquor from one to the
other. During this operation the ant receiving the mouthful of
sustenance keeps up an uninterrupted caressing, with fore legs and
antennæ, of the ant ministering to its needs.
“Who is not familiar with the lice that infest plants, assembled in
dense groups that contain each more members than one could easily
count? There are black lice on the beanstalks, green ones on the
rosebushes, their stomachs carrying, behind, two little tubes whence
oozes from time to time a tiny drop of liquid. This liquid is the ant’s
main dependence for food. Let us follow an ant on its rounds among the
plant-lice.
“It goes hither and thither among the motionless herd, which is nowise
disturbed by its presence. Having found what it is after, the ant
stations itself close to one of the lice, which it proceeds to caress
with gentle taps of its antennæ on the little creature’s stomach, first
on one side, then on the other. The milch-louse allows itself to be
seduced by these friendly overtures, and a drop of liquid oozes out at
the end of the tubes, the ant sucking it up at once. A second louse is
visited, and it too is solicited in the same caressing fashion. It
yields its drop of liquid and lets itself be milked, after which the
ant passes without delay to a third louse, which it coaxes in like
manner. A fourth, probably already drained, withstands the wheedling,
whereupon the ant, perceiving that nothing is to be hoped for there,
proceeds to a fifth member of the herd and obtains what it desires. A
few of these mouthfuls are enough to satisfy an ant, and then it
returns to its home.
“Certain ants are great stay-at-homes: for them it would be a painful
infliction to have to go out into the world. In order to spare
themselves this necessity they raise plant-lice and pasture them in
enclosures very near the ant-hill so that the milking may be done at
leisure. These herded plant-lice are their precious possession, and the
community is more or less rich as it owns more or less of this
property. It constitutes the ants’ flocks and herds, their cows and
goats. They build underground stables among the grass-roots, and there
keep the plant-lice which they obtain from a distance, just as we
gather our domestic animals under the roof of barn or fold.
“Others display an even more curious ingenuity: they take possession of
the lice living on some branch or twig of a growing bush, and,
jealously watchful of their cattle, suffer no stranger to come and lay
claim to the food-supply they themselves are preparing to appropriate.
With their mandibles they drive off all intruders; they patrol the twig
in vigilant defense and stand careful guard over their herds. If the
danger becomes too menacing, they hasten to carry away their livestock
and pasture it elsewhere, in a safe place.
“Or, as still another device, they take little pellets of earth and
build around the twig a sort of pavilion, a structure with a very
narrow opening, a sheep-fold, in a word, with a few leaves growing
inside it and furnishing sustenance to the enclosed flock. In this
quiet retreat the proprietors milk their ewes, safely sheltered from
rain and sun and, most important of all, from alien ants.
“We have in this region a rather large reddish ant known as the red ant
or Amazon ant, which cannot without help build its house, raise its
larvæ, procure food, or even eat food; but with its hooked mandibles it
is admirably equipped for fighting and pillage. Slaves are the object
of its predatory raids, slaves to feed it, to go out after provisions,
to build the ant-hill, and to rear the young. A small black or drab ant
is the object of its slave-hunting excursions.
“In battalions of some thousands each the reds go forth in quest of a
nest of drabs. They break into the ant-hill notwithstanding its
occupants’ resistance, and sack the underground city. Presently they
take their departure, each with his plunder between his mandibles. They
carry away, not the full-grown ants, since these could not be trained
to serve in the strange ant-hill and would speedily make their way back
to their former home, but the young ones, and the nymphs shut up in
their cocoons.
“Hatched in the domicile of the reds, the ants issuing from the stolen
cocoons look upon the natal ant-hill as their own and there fulfill
their customary duties with diligence. They go out after provender,
undertake all building operations, care for the larvæ of the Amazon
ants, and feed their big and stupid conquerors who, once in possession
of enough slaves, never leave home again.”