272 COMPOUND ANT-HIELS. 
their turn, are destined to become use- 
ful to the community. 
The ants, whose habitation I had de- 
ranged, had already furnished me with 
some traits leading to a conjecture of 
these truths. When the Amazons, deceiv- 
ed by the strange appearance of their nest, 
were wandering over the surface, unable 
to find a retreat, the Negro Ants, who 
were incessantly occupied in forming new 
galleries, and who knew better than they 
the new localities of the ant-hill, drew 
them from their embarrassment by taking 
them up gently in their mandibles, and 
conducting them to the galleries already 
pierced. An Amazon was frequeutly 
seen to approach a Negro, and play upon 
its head with its antenne, when the lat- 
ter immediately seized it in its pincers, 
and deposited it at one of the entrances. 
The Amazon Ant then unrolled itself, 
caressed once more its kind friend, and 
passed into the interior of the nest, 
It now and then happened that a Negro 
Ant, engaged in carrying an Amazon, 
