368 Mr. G. A. J. Eothney's notes 



which I think would fill a quart. If you watch you will 

 see a continuous but straggling stream of ants dis- 

 appearing down one of the small round entrances to 

 their nests, each carrying a grass-seed, which they bring 

 from the neighbouring grass, and another stream will 

 be seen emerging with the chaif, which they heap up 

 round the entrance in irregular mounds : when these 

 mounds begin to assume any dimensions the labour of 

 piling up the husks is divided ; the ant that brings one 

 out will throw it down just outside, or will mount a 

 short distance up the mound, when another will meet and 

 take on the husk and add it to the top, or when the 

 mound is a certain height, will shoot it down on the far 

 side to prevent its tumbling back on the entrance of the 

 nest. Sometimes three or four ants will be engaged in 

 this process, bringing out, passing on, piling up, and 

 shooting down. The ants bringing in the full seeds 

 collect them amongst the grass, which at this time of 

 the year is dry and ripe, and consequently much of the 

 seed is on the ground. I have never observed them 

 ascending the grass-stems to collect the seed. As soon 

 as the rains commence — about June 15th — the ants 

 seem to disappear, and although you can find specimens 

 about up to October, they are decidedly scarce. 



I have tried very many times to unearth one of these 

 nests, but never (except in one instance) with any 

 success. Directly you dig down a few inches in the 

 hard bricky soil you seem to lose all trace of ants and 

 nest. I have tried various instruments — a garden-knife, 

 a long bodkin, and a kourpi (a very handy native tool) — 

 but have always failed ; the way the ants disappear is 

 almost like magic. No doubt I ought to have tried a 

 kodali (native spade), but extensive excavations where 

 these ants formed their nests were hardly practicable 

 without obtaining the permission of the Park authorities, 

 which I never took the trouble to do at the time, though 

 now I have left India I never cease to regret that I did 

 not dig down several feet deep and a yard or two square. 



The one exception I have alluded to was a very small 

 nest, situated in the viceregal kitchen-garden part of 

 the Park, and where the soil was a sort of stiff clay 

 instead of brick-rubble; the tunnels were very small 

 and fine, and there was nothing peculiar about their 

 formation, but in the centre, a few inches from the 



