Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 27.djvu/765

Rh they stand, or promenade about, at the mouth of every tunnel, like Sister Ann, to see if anybody is coming. Sometimes somebody does come in the shape of another ant—the real ant this time, not the defenseless Neuropteron, but some valiant and belted knight from the warlike Formicidæ. Singly or in troops, this rapacious little insect, fearless in its chitinous coat-of-mail, charges down the tree-trunk, its antennæ waving defiance to the enemy and its cruel mandibles thirsting for termite blood. The worker white ant is a poor defenseless creature, and, blind and unarmed, would fall an immediate prey to these well-drilled banditti, who forage about in every tropical forest in unnumbered legion. But at the critical moment, like GoliahGoliath [sic] from the Philistines, the soldier termite advances to the fight. With a few sweeps of its scythe-like jaws it clears the ground, and, while the attacking party is carrying off its dead, the builders, unconscious of the fray, quietly continue their work. To every hundred workers in a white ant colony, which numbers many thousands of individuals, there are perhaps two of these fighting-men. The division of labor here is very wonderful, and the fact that besides these two specialized forms there are in every nest two other kinds of the same insect, the kings and queens, shows the remarkable height to which civilization in these communities has attained.

But where is this tunnel going to, and what object have the insects in view in ascending this lofty tree? Thirty feet from the ground, across innumerable forks, at the end of a long branch are a few feet of dead wood. How the ants know it is there, how they know its sap has dried up, and that it is now fit for the termites' food, is a mystery. Possibly they do not know, and are only prospecting on the chance. The fact that they sometimes make straight for the decaying limb argues in these instances a kind of definite instinct; but, on the other hand, the fact that in most cases the whole tree, in every branch and limb, is covered with termite-tunnels, would show perhaps that they work most commonly on speculation, while the number of abandoned tunnels, ending on a sound branch in a cul-de-sac, proves how often they must suffer the usual disappointments of all such adventurers. The extent to which these insects carry on their tunneling is quite incredible until one has seen it in nature with his own eyes. The tunnels are perhaps about the thickness of a small-sized gas-pipe, but there are junctions here and there of large dimensions, and occasionally patches of earth-work are found embracing nearly the whole trunk for some feet. The outside of these tunnels, which are never quite straight, but wander irregularly along stem and branch, resembles in texture a coarse sand-paper; and the color, although this naturally varies with the soil, is usually a reddish-brown. The quantity of earth and mud plastered over a single tree is often enormous; and when one thinks that it is not only an isolated specimen here and there that is frescoed in this way, but often the whole of the trees of a forest, some