102 HAMPSHIRE DAYS 



moving about in all directions over the ground, I saw a 

 green geometer caterpillar fall from an oak leaf above 

 to the earth, and no sooner had it dropped than an ant 

 saw and attacked it, seizing it at one end of its body 

 with his jaws. The caterpillar threw itself into a horse- 

 shoe form and then violently jerking its body round 

 flung the ant away to a distance of a couple of inches. 

 But the attack was renewed, and three times the ant 

 was thrown violently off; then another ant came, and 

 he, too, was twice thrown off; then a third ant joined in 

 the fight, and when all three had fastened their jaws on 

 their victim the struggle ceased, and the caterpillar was 

 dragged away. That is the fate of most caterpillars 

 that come to the ground. But the ants ascend the 

 trees; you see them going up and coming down in 

 thousands, and you find on examination that they dis- 

 tribute themselves over the whole tree, even to the 

 highest and farthest terminal twigs. And their num- 

 bers are incalculable here in the Forest, at all events. 

 Not only are their communities large, numbering 

 hundreds of thousands in a nest, but their nests here 

 are in hundreds, and it is not uncommon to find them 

 in groups, three or four up to eight or ten, all within a 

 distance of a few yards of one another. 



I had thought to write more, a whole chapter in fact, 

 on this fascinating and puzzling insect our "noble 

 ant," as our old ant lover Gould called it ; but I have 

 had to throw out that and much besides in order to 

 keep this book within reasonable dimensions. 



