66 JUNGLE ISLAND 



The army ants are not plant eaters, like the 

 Attas. They are meat eaters, like the big four- 

 legged woods animals. They eat insects, the 

 baby ants of other ant families, and any small 

 animal that is unfortunate enough to get in their 

 way. Since they are so nearly blind they hunt 

 together, a great many of them in an army, each 

 following the other by the sense of smell, and in 

 these great numbers they can overpower the 

 largest animal in their path. 



It does not take them long to clean up all the 

 small creatures in one place, and then they must 

 move on to find food in new country. Probably 

 they cannot stay more than four or five days in 

 one place. Then they move off again in a long 

 line, thousands and millions of them. The work- 

 ers carry the little white baby grubs in their 

 jaws. The soldiers move up and down the line, 

 directing it. 



They do not have time to dig the big under- 

 ground rooms that the Attas live in, nor to make 

 paper for nests like the Aztecas, but they do make 

 nests even when they settle down for only half 

 a week. It would be no use to ask any one to 

 guess what they use for building their portable 

 houses, and yet it is the easiest material they 

 could find and can be put up quickest. They 

 build with live ants! 



Each ant fits into place into the walls as if 

 he were a brick. With his long legs he holds 



