26 PARA. Chap. I. 



plenty of opportunities of seeing them at work. Tliey 

 mount the tree in multitudes, the individuals being all 

 worker-minors. Each one places itself on the surface of a 

 leaf, and cuts with its sharp scissor-like jaws a nearly 

 semicircular incision on the upper side ; it then takes 

 the edge between its jaws, and by a sharjD jerk detaches 

 the piece. Sometimes they let the leaf drop to the 

 ground, where a little heap accumulates, until carried 

 off by another relay of workers ; but, generally, each 

 marches off with the piece it has operated upon, and as 

 all take the same road to their colony, the path they 

 follow becomes in a short time smooth and bare, look- 

 ing like the impression of a cart-wheel through the 

 herbage. 



It is a most interesting sight to see the vast host of 

 busy diminutive labourers occupied on this work. Un- 

 fortunately they choose cultivated trees for their pur- 

 pose. This ant is quite peculiar to Tropical America, 

 as is the entire genus to which it belongs ; it some- 

 times despoils the young trees of species growing wild 

 in its native forests ; but it seems to prefer, when within 

 reach, plants imported from, other countries, such as 

 the coffee and orange trees. It has not hitherto been 

 shown satisfactorily to what Use it applies tjie leaves. 

 I discovered it only after much time sj^ent in investi- 

 gation. The leaves are used to thatch the domes which 

 cover the entrances to their subterranean dwellings, 

 thereby protecting from the deluging rains the young 

 broods in the nests beneath. The larger mounds, already 

 described, are so extensive that few j^ersons would at- 

 tempt to remove them for the purpose of examining 



