162 THE RING OF NATURE 



And now the trodden mole hill is buried fathom 

 deep in a huge pile of tiny sticks thirty feet in 

 circumference, and the pile of sticks seems to be 

 covered in turn with a solid mass of ants. But 

 when I dig a small breach in it with a stick it seems 

 to be composed throughout of ants, for they rush 

 up from the depth, slipping on the tumbling 

 fragments, and boiling rank over rank till the 

 hole seems solid with ants, and then for those who 

 are looking for it a tiny spray of liquid shoots 

 into the air from all over the heap. The ants are 

 standing on their hind legs with the abdomen 

 upmost, and are shooting microscopic streams of 

 formic acid at the invader of their city. If you 

 put your hand within six or seven inches of the 

 hill it is covered with the poison in such minute 

 doses that, though there is no sign of moisture, 

 the pungent odour can be smelt on the palm for 

 hours after. 



Dig a little deeper into the heap and the huge 

 ' eggs ' are discovered, larger than grains of wheat, 

 and apparently tossed there anyhow in a heap 

 under the sticks. They are, of course, pupa cases, 

 and at this time of year contain not merely young 

 worker ants but winged males and females. 



I have never seen the wood ants swarm. It 

 should be a sight like the swarming of bees. 

 Even the little red and black ants of the field 

 produce many hundreds of ' flies ' nearly as big as 

 bees. On a given hot day, the whole community 

 is given over to the vital holiday feast. There 



