The Pine Wood 



heath. Many of the lesser stones were spotted with 

 dark dots of lichen, not unlike a toad. 



Thoughtlessly turning over a boulder about nine 

 inches square, lo! there was subject enough for 

 thinking underneath it a subject that has been 

 thought about many thousand years; for this piece 

 of rock had formed the roof of an ants' nest. The 

 stone had sunk three inches deep into the dry soil of 

 sand and peaty mould, and in the floor of the hole 

 the ants had worked out their excavations, which 

 resembled an outline map. The largest excavation 

 was like England; at the top, or north, they had 

 left a narrow bridge, an eighth of an inch wide, under 

 which to pass into Scotland, and from Scotland again 

 another narrow arch led to the Orkney Islands ; these 

 last, however, were dug in the perpendicular side of 

 the hole. In the corners of these excavations tunnels 

 ran deeper into the ground, and the ants immediately 

 began hurrying their treasures, the eggs, down into 

 these cellars. At one angle a tunnel went beneath 

 the heath into further excavations beneath a second 

 boulder stone. Without, a fern grew, and the dead 

 dry stems of heather crossed each other. 



This discovery led to the turning over of another 

 boulder stone not far off, and under it there appeared 

 a much more extensive and complete series of galleries, 

 bridges, cellars and tunnels. In these the whole life- 

 history of the ant was exposed at a single glance, as 

 if one had taken off the roofs of a city. One cell 

 contained a dust-like deposit, another a collection 

 resembling the dust, but now elongated and a little 

 greenish; a third treasury, much larger, was piled 

 up with yellowish grains about the size of wheat, 

 each with a black dot on the top, and looking like 

 minute hop-pockets. Besides these, there was a pure 



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