180 



ANT-CATCHER. 



attack the ants in their hills, and bring them out by 

 breaching these; and the reptiles generally watch 

 by those paths along which the ants pass in great 

 numbers. Both of these too, in general, capture by 

 means of a pro^rusile tongue, which is limed with a 

 very adhesive viscus, so that many ants are taken 

 at a time. The birds, on the other hand, capture 

 them singly with the bill, and capture them whenever 

 they are inclined. Each ant-feeding class has thus 

 its jmrticular season, and the one does not interfere 

 with the other ; even if they did, the ants in the 

 warm countries are so numerous, and they breed so 

 fast, that there would still be ample provision for 

 them all. 



The ants, the white ants [see TERMITES'], and vari- 

 ous analogous tribes, act a very important part in 

 wild nature in the tropical climates. They are 

 scavengers to a very great extent in clearing the wreck 

 and rubbish both of animal and of vegetable matter, 

 consuming even the boles of large trees, which are 

 constantly decaying in those places, and which, if 

 they were to remain, would not only taint the atmo- 

 sphere with pernicious gases, but would float away 

 when the rains came, and thus exhaust and impover- 

 ish the soil. This preventing of the matter, which 

 has once been organised, and which, on that account, 

 is fit for the support of new organisations, from float- 

 ing away, is a very important matter ; and, but for 

 it, the whole of those tropical countries which have 

 extremes of dry and humid seasons, would be in 

 rapid progress toward the desert state. But the 

 matter is taken up by those countless myriads of 

 insects ; and in them it lives anew for a season. 

 Then the birds and other vertebrated animals feed 

 upon them, and it passes into new forms of life, each 

 one supporting some other, and the whole preserving 

 and maintaining the fertility of the country. This is 

 what may be termed nature's mode of culture : the 

 fungi among plants, and the insects among animals, 

 take: hold of that which is on the brink of ruin; 

 and from them it passes from race to race, till 

 at the end of the circuit it arrives at the most stately 

 trees of the forest, and the largest animals which 

 feed and repose in their shade ; so that, by a circle 

 of minor destructions, the grand destruction of the 

 whole is prevented. 



The forests of tropical America are at least among 

 the places where this natural system is in the fullest 

 operation, without having been interfered with by 

 man ; and from the peculiarity of its structure, and 

 the large portion of it which is in a state of nature, 

 the system, perhaps, extends more polarly in North 

 America than in any other region on the globe. 

 The valley of the Mississippi, especially that on the 

 right bank of the river, from Louisiana northwards, 

 skirling along the Rocky Mountains, has its atmo- 

 spheric action from north to south, and south to 

 north, between the tropical climates and the polar 

 ice ; and though the average temperature is much 

 lower, there are many features in it which have at 

 least a relation to . tropical ones. Among the rest, 

 there are numerous ants and ant-catchers, some of 

 which are better known than those of more southerly 

 latitudes. The species best known, indeed the onlv 

 one which has hitherto bee^i found in these northern 

 parts, is 



The Rocky Mountain ant-catcher (mygiatheria abso- 

 cta), of which the following description will serve as 

 a specimen of the American birds of the genus. 



" The Rocky Mountain Ant-catcher," says Lncien 

 Bonaparte, in his addition to " Wilson's Ame- 

 rican Ornithology," is six inches long. The bill, 

 measured from the corner of the mouth, is more 

 than one inch in length, being slightly curved 

 almost from the base ; it is very slender, being nearly 

 two-eighths of an inch in diameter at the base, and 

 only the sixteenth of an inch in the middle, whence it 

 continues to diminish to the tip ; and is of a dark 

 horn colour, paler beneath. The feet are dusky ; and 

 the length of the tarsus is seven-eighths of an inch. 

 The irides are dark brown ; the whole plumage above 

 is of a dusky-brownish, slightly undulated with pale, 

 tinted with dull ferruginous on the top of the head 

 and superior portions of the back. The sides of the 

 head are dull whitish, with a broad brown Hue passing 

 through the eye to the commencement of the neck. 

 The chin, throat, and breast are whitish, each feather 

 being marked by a longitudinal line of light brown. 

 The belly is white ; and the flanks are slightly tinged 

 with ferruginous. The primaries are entirely desti- 

 tute of undulations or spots ; the tail-coverts are pale, 

 each with four or five fuscous bands ; the inferior tail- 

 coverts are white, each being bifasciate with blackish 

 brown. The tail is nearly two inches long, rounded, 

 broadly tipped with ferruginous yellow, and having 

 a narrow black band before the tip ; the remaining 

 part of the tail is of the same colour with the wings 

 and is obsoletely banded, these bands being more dis- 

 tinct on the two middle feathers, which arc destitute 

 of the black and yellowish termination : the exterior 

 feather is dusky at tip, marked by four yellowish- 

 white spots on the exterior, and by two larger ones on 

 the inner web. 



" The specimen of the rocky mountain ant-catcher 

 we are describing, is a male, shot in the month of July, 

 and possibly not adult. As it is the only one brought' 

 by Major Long's party we cannot determine the 

 extent or nature of the variations the species may 

 undergo from age, sex, or season. 



" The note of this bird is peculiar, resembling the 

 harsh voice of the terns. It inhabits the sterile country 

 bordering on the river Arkansaw, in the neighbour- 

 hood of the Rocky Mountains, where it is frequently 

 observed hopping on the ground, or flitting among 

 the branches, or weather-beaten, half-inclining trunks 

 of a species of juniper : when it flies among the 

 crooked limbs of this tree, it spreads its tail consider- 

 ably, but was never seen to climb. They were gene- 

 rally observed in small associations of five or six 

 individuals, perhaps composing single families." 



The following general observations, by the same 

 author, are also worthy of quotation. 



" The ant-catchers may justly be enumerated 

 amongst the benefactors of mankind, as they dwell in 

 regions where the ants are so numerous, large, and 

 voracious, that, without their agency, co-operating 

 with that of the Myrmccophaga jubata, and a few other 

 ant-eating quadrupeds, the produce of the soil would 

 inevitably be destroyed in those fertile parts of the 

 globe. The ant-hills of South America are often 

 more than twenty feet in diameter, and many feet in 

 height. These wonderful edifices are thronged with " 

 two hundred-fold more inhabitants, and are propor- 

 tionally far more numerous, than the small ones with 

 which we are familiar. Breeding in vast numbers, 

 and multiplying with great celerity and profusion, 

 the increase of these insects would soon enable them 

 to swarm over the greatest extent of country, were 



