THE ARMY ANTS' HOME TOWN 59 



Number Five.^ I was wondering whether I 

 should ever see the army ants in any guise other 

 than that of scouting, batthng searchers for liv- 

 ing prey, when a voice of the jungle seemed to 

 hear my unexpressed wish. The sharp, high 

 notes of white-fronted antbirds — those white- 

 crested watchers of the ants — came to my ears, 

 and I left my table and followed up the sound. 

 Physically, I merely walked around the bunga- 

 low and approached the edge of the jungle at a 

 point where we had erected a small outhouse a 

 day or two before. But this two hundred feet 

 might just as well have been a single step through 

 quicksilver, hand in hand with Alice, for it took 

 me from a world of hyoids and syrinxes, of vials 

 and lenses and clean-smelling xylol, to the home 

 of the army ants. 



The antbirds were chirping and hopping about 

 on the very edge of the jungle, but I did not have 

 to go that far. As I passed the doorless entrance 

 of the outhouse I looked up, and there was an im- 

 mense mass of some strange material suspended 

 in the upper corner. It looked like stringy, 

 chocolate-colored tow, studded with hundreds of 

 tiny ivory buttons. I came closer and looked 



1 See Jungle Peace, p. 211. 



