THE ANTS. 



49 



to an Arab. But other ants are content to milk the unre- 

 sisting little cattle whenever they find them ; the red ants 

 domesticate them. 



The ant to which Solomon sent sluggards was plainly the 

 agricultural ant which lives in the fields. A space of ground 

 round the mouth of its hole, about as wide as the hat of a 

 padre whose views are just beginning to get ritualistic, is 

 always cleared, like a threshing-floor, and covered thick 

 with the husks and chaff of the grain stored inside. These 

 holes are the gateways of great cities, and from them broad 

 well-beaten roads lead away in all directions to other 

 distant cities. Late and early these roads are thronged 

 with crov/ds of busy ants. As I sit and watch them on a 

 sunny morning, the primitive ryot stops shrieking at his 

 perverse byles, and for a moment puzzles his foggy brain to 

 guess what I am doing. He believes I am on the scent of 

 hid treasure, but his more intelligent neighbour says I am 

 simply illustrating the inscrutable ways of the sahib. 



I confess I lean towards Sir John Lubbock's view that 

 ants are gifted with reason like ourselves. There is no 

 objection to explaining the wonderful things they do by 

 instinct, but only a new meaning will have to be invented 

 for the word. The instinct which a weaver-bird shows in 



