828 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



pearance, and, by a series of little hesitating, jerky, zigzag trots, 

 made his way up within about an inch of the chameleon. Either 

 by sight or smell, or in some other way, this ant evidently rec- 

 ognized the lost treasure. Without a second's delay he turned 

 sharply about and ran down the chair leg and disappeared some- 

 where under the matting with which the floor was covered. In a 

 little less than a minute four ants made their appearance on the 

 scene and carefully reconnoitred the field ; this time two of them 

 came and felt the body of the anolis, executed a few little zigzag 

 trots, touched antennae, and started back again for the chair leg. 

 By this time a dozen or more had climbed on to the chair seat 

 and were running about the dead body. Any further attempt to 

 keep watch of individual ants was of course abandoned. Most of 

 them did not go near the object of their gathering, but simply 

 ran back and forth over the chair bottom in seemingly the most 

 aimless way. After ten minutes had passed, and probably a hun- 

 dred more or less of the little fellows were assembled and plenty 

 were coming, they began to gather around the body, first four or 

 five, then ten, twenty, thirty. There appeared to be no captain or 

 leader, and seemingly very little concert of action. Those that 

 came up would give a little tug, and then away possibly to some 

 other part of the body, or may be to scamper over the chair bot- 

 tom among the crowd of apparent idlers. I found it very difficult 

 to count those that were at any moment pulling or pushing 

 both were evidently being done as they worked from either side 

 but as near as I could count, forty ants were the most that at any 

 one time were tugging at this, to them, relatively enormous load. 

 After trying various points with very little success, they finally 

 gathered, about thirty of them, at the tail. This they readily 

 swung around. They had at last "got the hang of it." Perhaps 

 I imagined it, but it seemed to me I could see the added enthu- 

 siasm with which they now tugged away at their burden. Then 

 the tail moved faster, then the head was pulled and pushed for- 

 ward ; and so, by swinging first one end and then the other, the, 

 to them, gigantic mass was moved steadily toward the edge of the 

 chair. I think here is a clear case of thought, afterthought, con- 

 trivance, the abandonment of one plan that proved a failure and 

 the adoption of another that proved a success. They tried at 

 first to move the whole weight, and found it too much for them ; 

 they then tried swinging it around one end at a time, and suc- 

 ceeded. What human engineering skill without tools could have 

 done better ? 



One curious fact that I observed was that these ants do not 

 fancy steady work. Most of them would come up and give a 

 little push or pull and scamper off to join the crowd that was 

 racing about on all sides. Occasionally one would tug away for 



