THE ANTS 2991 



a wooden bridge would, in most cases, instantly turn round, if their heads were 

 turned in an opposite direction, by the bridge being made to rotate on a point. 

 And they would at once lose the sense of direction if light was shut out from the 

 artificial tract prepared for them, while if the candle were moved round in the 

 same direction as the bridge over which they traveled, though the direction be 

 changed, the ant does not become aware of it, because the rays of light fall from 

 the same point. Nevertheless, the sense of smell is evidently the stronger, for 

 ants carrying larvae from a cup to the nest still continue their course, although the 

 board on which they are traveling be turned right round. They follow the scent of 

 former tracks rather than take notice of the direction in which the light falls. 



It is obvious that without some faculty representing, at any rate, the rudiments 

 of memory, ants would not be able to recognize even the scent left by comrades on 

 the ground, nor would they persistently seek for an object which had been removed. 

 They exhibit, however, all the phenomena of true memory. A fact, by repetition, 

 becomes more firmly fixed as a sense impression on their brains. It fades away if 

 not refreshed. Evidence in favor of a highly-developed sense of memory is fur- 

 nished by the fact that ants from a certain nest were in the habit of journeying; 

 year by year, during the season of activity, to a chemist's shop, six hundred yards 

 distant, to a syrup jar. It is scarcely likely that the jar was found every year by 

 fresh ants, so that memory alone will account for the circumstance. It is perhaps 

 in the recognition of friends, however, that ants manifest the most extraordinary 

 powers of memory. They invariably recognize a friend, while a stranger is almost 

 instantly slain. Ants held captive for months, and returned to the nest, are recog- 

 nized as lost friends, and caressed with the antennae. This recognition might be 

 merely a matter of the well-known odor of a friend; but even then it must be a 

 national smell, for it is scarcely possible that each can recognize the personal scent 

 of every individual. Not only do they recognize the perfect ants, but even the off- 

 spring, or eggs, removed and hatched in other nests, and returned home full grown, 

 are recognized as kith and kin, while their foster mothers are slain. One can 

 hardly suppose that the scent, unless such be inherited, would account for such 

 recognition. 



Whereas ants show evidence of such feelings as rage and combativeness, the 

 emotion of sympathy is by no means as constant or intense as might be supposed 

 from their general intelligence and power of recognizing friends. Mutilated ants, 

 and those in difficulties, are passed by on the other side; but an intoxicated ant 

 staggering in its tracks does not fail to excite astonishment, and is carried off as a 

 sort of curiosity to the nest. Chloroform ants, however, are dropped into the 

 water, where they were, of course, motionless. That ants have the power of com- 

 municating intelligence admits of no doubt. Two ants were introduced, the one 

 to three hundred or six hundred larvae in one glass, the other to two or three in 

 another glass, each took a larva and returned to the nest. A larva was added to 

 the second glass every time one was taken. In forty-seven and a half hours the 

 ant which was introduced to the six hundred larvae had brought two hundred and 

 fifty-seven friends to help, while the other in fifty-three hours had brought but 

 eighty-two. 



