264 The Great World's Farm 



ing, biting, she clears everything away, no matter how 

 rank the growth. And this is not all, for the space is not 

 only cleared once, but kept clear till the "ant-corn" has 

 ripened — a matter involving no small labor where it is 

 surrounded by a dense growth of weeds always ready to 

 encroach. 



The crop consists of a tall, yellowish grass, and not so 

 much as a blade of any other species is allowed among it. 

 It ripens about the end of June, when the seed is cut from 

 the stalk and carefully stored. That which falls of itself 

 to the ground is not harvested, and it is probably from 

 this that the next year's crop springs, though some have 

 declared that the ants actually sow as well as reap. 

 Harvest over, the dry stubble is cut and cleared away, 

 and weeds are left to grow as they will during winter, the 

 work of cutting them down beginning vigorously again in 

 spring. 



These ants live chiefly on grass seeds, which they 

 gather from a distance as well as from the home crop; 

 but though they do not steal food from the farmer, they 

 inflict much injury on his fields, and destroy many an acre 

 of produce, no amount of plowing being sufficient to drive 

 them away. 



We cannot attempt any description of the devastations 

 caused by locusts, one of whom is reported by Mahomet 

 to have remarked, **We are the army of the great God; 

 we produce ninety-nine eggs. If the hundred were com- 

 plete, we should consume the whole earth and all that is 

 in it." Nor can we tell of the ravages of the American 

 crickets, which eat up a whole crop of maize in a night; 

 or of the caterpillars, which would completely destroy the 

 tobacco plantations if not constantly picked off leaf by 



