112 TRINIDAD. 



danger, they remain quite still, and sometimes drop down 

 motionless; they seem also to be more delicate as regards the 

 choice of their food. The red parasol ants are larger in size ; 

 they never build in walls, but in the high forest, and particularly 

 in the neighbourhood of plantations : their nests look like so 

 many mounds, some being from two to three feet high, and from 

 twenty to thirty feet in diameter. When they have once settled 

 in a locality they never remove, unless compelled: the nest or 

 township is gradually increased from two or three feet, on the 

 first settlement, to thirty feet in diameter. The parasol ant 

 shows a great deal of discrimination in the selection of a spot 

 wherein to build its nest ; generally, it is on a gentle slope, or 

 near the bank of some brook. The nest is composed, according 

 to the extent of the township, of a greater or lesser number of 

 spherical excavations, each of them being, in general, traversed 

 or crossed by a tree-rootlet : they are separated from each other 

 by a rather thick wall, and communication is effected between 

 the different excavations or chambers by passages cut through 

 the walls ; these have access also to a larger public passage, 

 which opens out at the lower part of the nest on the declivity. 

 The earth dug from the excavations is accumulated on the nest, 

 so as to give it the mound-like form already mentioned. In 

 each of the chambers are deposited the larvae and nymphs, in a 

 soft, light substance of a whitish colour ; this sort of bed is 

 moulded on the excavation, and is generally laid around the root, 

 which was probably preserved for the purpose. The female ants 

 are also lodged in the same substance, and fresh leaves are 

 therein deposited, undoubtedly for food for the larvae and 

 nymphs, and also for the females. I suppose they suck the juice 

 of the leaves, the parenchymatous part being left to be prepared 

 into the white substance above mentioned. Several highways 

 diverge from the nest, branching off afterwards in the various 

 directions which lead to the trees or localities whence they 

 procure their food. Their dwellings are kept perfectly clean, all 

 rubbish and dry leaves being carried away, every day, to a place 

 of deposit, through the common passage already noticed, whi< 

 may be considered as the main sewer of the township ; it 

 about one inch high by three or four inches wide. Not far frc 

 the place of deposit is what may be termed the cemetery, 

 which all dead and enfeebled ants are carried and there deposit 



