SUPPLYING THE COMMUNAL RATIONS 



edibles seems small. But to the omnivorous appetite 

 of ants it is, under favorable conditions, practically in- 

 exhaustible. Ants have proverbially u a sweet tooth." 

 In the vegetable kingdom, nature's vast fecundity of 

 flowers and blossoms and sappy sw r eets, so far beyond 

 what seems required for continuing the species, may seem 

 a great waste. But to the insect world it presents a 

 bountiful harvest. One sees them, of all the orders, 

 winged and unwinged, as larvae, as nymphs, as imagines, 

 in countless hordes drawing upon this exhaustless store. 

 Among these insects, ants are everywhere most 

 prominent ; on the low-growing plants, close to mother 

 earth, high up on the lofty trees, and in all grades be- 

 tween they peek and mouse. In companies, in bands, 

 in ones and twos, their busy inquisition is pushed, and 

 their restless antennae wave and tremble. They dip 

 into the flower-cups, and drink of the nectar there. 

 They scout over leaves. They exploit the trunks and 

 boughs. They are everywhere in Flora's beautiful 

 domain, lapping her sweets, filling their crops with her 

 treasures, growing rich from her redundancy, not for 

 themselves alone, but for the helpless dependents of 

 their communes. They jostle their winged kindred, the 

 bees, the wasps, the hornets, the yellow-jackets, who 

 come by the shorter aerial ways, but are fewer than the 

 persistent and ubiquitous ants, who plod and climb by 

 the roundabout routes which apterous beings must take. 

 There is enough for all ; and although I have seen thou- 

 sands of these various forms feeding cheek by jowl upon 

 some rare harvest feast of bountiful Flora's spreading, I' 

 recall no scenes of violence arising from the casual con- 

 tact. Let the reader give no credit for this to the peace- 

 ful temper of the insects. Simply, it is hard to quarrel 



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