4 THE EVOLUTIONIST AT LARGE. 



the great boulders which strew the path, and 

 which are known to our Brobdingnagian in- 

 telligence as grains of sand. Besides the 

 workers themselves, a whole battalion of 

 stragglers runs to and fro upon the broad 

 line which leads to the head-quarters of the 

 community. The province of these stragglers, 

 who seem so busy doing nothing, probably 

 consists in keeping communications open, and 

 encouraging the sturdy pullers by occasional 

 relays of fresh workmen. I often wish that 

 I could for a while get inside those tiny brains, 

 and see, or rather smell, the world as ants do. 

 For there can be little doubt that to these 

 brave little carnivores here the universe is 

 chiefly known as a collective bundle of 

 odours, simultaneous or consecutive. As 

 our world is mainly a world of visible ob- 

 jects, theirs, I believe, is mainly a world of 

 olfactible things. 



In the head of every one of these little 

 creatures is something that we may fairly call 

 a brain. Of course most insects have no real 





