306 ANNUAL REPORT SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION, 1911. 
THE TRUE ANTS. 
ABUNDANCE. 
Although ants are not everywhere equally abundant in tropical 
South America, their numbers are so large on an average as to 
promptly attract the attention of travelers, even when they do not 
excite their wonder. Residents, who might be expected to have con- 
servative views on the subject, often speak of them as the owners of 
the land. Such a remark is at first regarded as merely facetious, but 
the character of some of the writers who make it entitles it to serious 
consideration. As long ago as 1648 Piso said that the Portuguese not 
inappropriately called the ant the ‘‘king of Brazil.” ? 
Another naturalist who spent some time in the country says, 
‘‘Brazil is one great ants’ nest.’’? Belt says, ‘‘They are one of the 
greatest scourges of tropical America.” ® 
A Brazilian traveler says of the region of the upper Rio, Paraguay, 
“The ant and the different kinds of termites own the land.” 4 
Another puts it in this fashion: “. . . ants . . . deserve to 
be considered the actual owners of the Amazon Valley far more than 
the red or the white man.” § 
These characterizations and others that might be given are so 
sweeping that, taken alone, they are open to the suspicion of being 
merely picturesque and extravagant ebullitions rather than serious 
statements of fact. If they are based on some knowledge of the ants, 
these expressions seem to spring from more or less personal animosity 
toward those insects. And yet this very animosity, if it really exists, 
must come from’a pretty uniform personal experience of them. Dr. 
Auguste Forel says that ‘‘the ant fauna of South America is perhaps 
the richest in the world from the systematic point of view.” ® In the 
book cited 440 species of true ants are noted as inhabiting Brazil, out 
of a total of 2,000 known in the world. 
But though it is with the number of individuals rather than the 
number of species that we are concerned, it is worth remembering that 
in many considerable regions a single species may occupy about all the 
ground space that it is possible for ants to occupy. A single species 
may thus fairly swarm and do a vast deal more work than several 
different species. 
The true ants, evidently of a large number of species, are so 
abundant and are such serious pests in some places that the land is 
1 Formice autem he (Rey do Brasil Lusitanis non immerito dictz, quod perpetuam tyrannidem exer- 
ceant) aliquz Europzarum plane similes, aliqu triplo majores & alate, omnivore sunt. 
De Aeribus, Aquis, & Locis. Gvilielmi Pisonis Historie Naturalis & Medicz, p.9. Amsterdam, 1658. 
2 Rev. H. Clark: Letters home from Spain, etc., pp. 131, 173. London, 1867. 
8 Thomas Belt: The naturalist in Nicaragua, p. 79. London, 1874. 
4Dr. Joao Severiano da Fonseca. Viagem ao redor do Brazil, vol. 1, p. 352. Rio de Janeiro, 1880. 
& Richard Spruce: Notes of a botanist on the Amazon and Andes, vol. 2, p. 366. London, 1908. 
6A. Forel: A fauna das formigas do Brazil. Bol. do Museu Paraense, vol. 1, p. 89. Para, 1895. 
