188 WARS OF ANTS. 
Such are the combats between ants of 
different size; but if we wish to behold 
regular armies, war in all its form, we 
must visit those forests in which the 
Fallow. Ants establish their dominion 
over every insect in their territory. We 
shall there see populous and rival cities, 
regular roads passing from the ant-hill as 
scarcely did they feel the fresh breeze passing over 
them, than their animosity rekindled, and the field 
of their liberty became the theatre of sanguinary 
combat. For a few moments each party seemed 
engaged in discovering a place of retreat, and it was 
only on returning to the ruins of their original 
prison, to bring off the rest of their companions, that 
they encountered and waged way upon each other. 
What was as singular as unexpected, they fought in 
pairs, in no one instunce en masse ; indeed, it only 
twice happened, although the ground was strewed 
with combatants, that a third came to the aid of 
its companion, and even then, as if conscious of the 
unequal contest, one immediately retired. It was 
inconceivable with what desperate fury, and with 
what determined obstinacy they fastened upon 
each other. With their mandibles alone they often 
succeeded in effecting a complete separation of the 
body of their antagonist, of which the ground ex- 
hibited many proofs when IJ revisited it. — T. 
