128 Chapter III. 



of such disagreeable objects. It is utterly useless to 

 embellish the life of ants with fabulous anecdotes like 

 that Australian burial story. The cold facts are inter- 

 esting and wonderful enough. 



6. Is the Architecture of Ants Guided by Intelligence? 



The building instinct of ants proves to be such a 

 universal faculty, and its application to various pur- 

 poses is in many cases seemingly so intelligent, that 

 we are finally confronted by the question: Why 

 should we not call this an intellectual faculty! The 

 following discussion will probably throw some light 

 on the subject. 



, Would it not be a proof of intelligence, if ants, 

 not themselves provided with spinning glands, 

 employed their larvae for manufacturing threads, by 

 means of which they build a nest of leaves? Accord- 

 ing to W. D. Holland's observations this is done by a 

 large, reddish-yellow ant of Eastern Asia called 

 Oecophylla smaragdina, whose nests he studied in 

 Ceylon. 1 With their mandibles the ants first bring into 

 the proper position the leaves to be connected and keep 

 them there; then others approach in large numbers, 

 each carrying a larva in its mouth, with which they 

 begin to move across the leaves from side to side. 

 Wherever the mouth of the larva touches the leaf, a 

 thread appears sticking to the leaf. This process is 

 continued, until the leaves are attached to one another 

 at their edges by a firm tissue of threads, and finally 

 a viscous, paper-like stuff is formed consisting of 

 innumerable threads crossing each other in all direc- 



*) E. E. Green, "On the habits of Oecophylla smaragdina F." 

 ("Proceedings of the Entomological Society of London," 1896, p. IX.). 



