io8 Notes on Jungle and Other Wild Life. 



or stream of ofiicered and picketed red ants (Monomorium 

 pliaraonis Linn., to furnish the necessary scientific background) 

 travelling- along and forming the inch-wide periphery of a circle 

 thirty vards in diameter. We made several experiments with 

 this ant " material," but the most remarkable incident occurred 

 when we removed the basket altogether ; marshalled and 

 captained as before, the pharaohic host disappeared as if by 

 magic into their home by the baseboard. We never saw them 

 again, unless as individuals, as isolated detachments or as small 

 squads scouting for miscroscopic grains of food. Doubtless 

 it is an easy matter for the close student of Fabre and other 

 psycho-entomologists to say wdio carried the first news of the 

 basket treasure, who ordered and generalled the expeditionary 

 forces, and who eventually sounded the general retreat, but to 

 mere observers like E. and myself the mystery deepens the more 

 we see of these comparatively simple and every-day insects. 

 As for the Army ants, we are all at sea. When we consider 

 their ways we are not wise. 



It is only fair to add to these platitudes that after I had 

 penned them I saw the following account of the activities of an 

 alHed species, written for the Demerara Argosy, January i8th, 

 1922, by a well-knowni Guiana naturalist — Mr. Harold W. P. 

 Moore. He answers several of these questions, and says : — 

 " I • M.iere any animal other than man that can so clearly inform 

 another of its kind where a particular object is that the one told 

 can go and find the object without much difficulty? Yes, there 

 is. and the animal wdiich shares this power with man is none 

 Gth.er than the ant. Times without number have T seen ants 

 tell another where a bit of food could be found, and seen this 

 second go right off and find it, but it comes home forcibly to me 

 now because only last week I saw it done. One of my windows 

 is frequented by a certain kind of warlike and carnivorous ant-- 

 always among the most intelligent of the lot —which is in the 

 habit of taking by force from some spiders any flies or other 

 insects these may happen to entrap. When the ant arrives on 

 the scene, the s]')iders soon have to leave them in possession of 

 whatever prey their webs and skill may have got them. They 

 are unable to fight the ants. As it was the first time T have had 

 an opportunity of observing this particular species of ant, I 

 thought I would experiment with it, as I have done before with 



