76 THE NATURALIST IN NICARAGUA. [Cli. V. 



ant-food and young ants in every stage of growth ; but I 

 soon found that the underground ramifications extended 

 so far, and to so great a depth, whilst the ants were con- 

 tinually at work making fresh excavations, that it would 

 be an immense task to eradicate them by such means ; 

 and notwithstanding all the digging I had done the first 

 day, I found them as busily at work as ever at my 

 garden, which they were rapidly defoliating. At this 

 stage, our medical officer, Dr. J. H. Simpson,* came 

 to my assistance, and suggested the pouring carbolic acid, 

 mixed with water, down their burrows. The suggestion 

 proved a most valuable one. We had a quantity of 

 common brown carbolic acid, about a pint of which I 

 mixed with four buckets of water, and, after stirring it 

 well about, poured it down the burrows ; I could hear it 

 rumbling down to the lowest depths of the formicarium 

 four or five feet from the surface. The effect was all 

 that I could have wished : the marauding parties were 

 at once drawn off from my garden to meet the new danger 

 at home. The whole formicarium was disorganised. Big 

 fellows came stalking up from the cavernous regions 

 below, only to descend again in the utmost perplexity. 



Next day, I found them busily employed bringing up 

 the ant- food from the old burrows, and carrying it to a 

 new one a few yards distant ; and here I first noticed a 

 wonderful instance of their reasoning powers. Between 

 the old burrows and the new one was a steep slope. 



* This gentleman, beloved by all who knew him, of rare talent, 

 and with every prospect of a prosperous career before him, died at 

 Jamaica from hydrophobia, between two and three months after 

 being bitten by a small dog that had not itself shown any symptoms 

 .of that disease. 



