9 g NATURAL HISTORY. 



" but Lincecum describes one over three hundred feet long, which traversed 

 sixty feet of thick weeds, underran heavy beds of crop-grass one hundred 

 and eighty feet, and then through the weeds growing in the locks of a 

 1 1 .aw rail fence sixty feet more. Throughout its whole extent this road 

 was very smooth and even, and varied from a straight line only so far as 

 to lose some thirty feet of distance in passing from the pavement to the 

 outer terminus. The width was from two to two and a half inches." 



Some of the ants are provided with stings, situated like those of the 

 bees at the tip of the abdomen ; in others these stings are rudimentary, 

 and of no functional importance, and yet these have well-developed poison- 

 glands, and some are capable of projecting the poison, according to Lubbock, 

 to a distance of eighteen inches. The jaws, however, are the most impor- 

 tant organs of offence and defence ; and no one who has not watched a 

 battle between two colonies can have any idea of the more than bulldog- 

 like pertinacity with which the grip will be maintained. Frequently one 

 will see a head entirely severed from the body, and yet the jaws are clasped 

 tightly around the victim. These battles are most interesting to watch, 

 and it will be noticed that each species has its own characteristic manner 

 of attack. Some attack singly, while others advance in regular armies, 

 and still others attempt to terrify rather than to kill. Some of these 

 battles are due to the hatred which one species seems to bear towards 

 another, or even to an animosity existing between two colonies of the 

 same species. Others are undertaken for the purpose of making slaves of 

 the victims, and this opens up a most interesting side of ant-economy. 



There are many of these slave-making ants, and among them we find 

 that slavery is not an unmixed good. The slave-makers on their expedi- 

 tions bring back the pupae of their victims, and from these are reared the 

 slaves, who have to partake in the domestic duties of the colony of their 

 captors. In some they are assisted in this by the victors ; but others, like 

 the Amazons, " present a striking lesson of the degrading tendency of slav- 

 ery, for these ants have become entirely dependent upon their slaves. 

 Even their bodily structure has undergone a change ; the mandibles have 

 lost their teeth, and have become mere nippers, deadly weapons indeed, but 

 useless except in war. They have lost the greater part of their instincts ; 

 their art, that is the power of building ; their domestic habits, for they show 

 no care for their own young, all this being done by slaves ; their industry, 

 — they take no part in providing the daily supplies : if the colony change 

 the situation of the nest, the masters are all carried on the backs of the 

 slaves to the new one; nay, they have even lost the habit of feeding. 

 Huber placed thirty of them with some larvae and pupae and a supply of 

 honey in a box. 'At first,' he says, 'they appeared to pay some little 



