Leaves from a Madeira Garden 



the attentions of a small species of ant, which 

 has so abounded in recent years as to amount 

 to a veritable plague. " An ant," said the 

 wisest of mankind, " is a wise creature for itself, 

 but it is a shrewd thing in an orchard or 

 garden." This particular species is said to 

 have been imported in recent times from 

 Mauritius or Brazil with some sugar-cane 

 plants. It has certainly flourished after the 

 manner of new importations — the rabbit in 

 Australia, the measles in Fiji, the trout in New 

 Zealand. But I have doubts as to the alleged 

 origin of this ant ; I find complaints of the 

 abundance of a similar pest in books published 

 fifty or sixty years ago. Its numbers appear to 

 have been steadily diminishing in our garden 

 during the last year or two, and such shrubs 

 as Oka fragranSy which it formerly permitted 

 only just to exist, are now growing vigorously. 

 Yet it has had its uses ; it has destroyed most 

 of the fleas with which the streets of Funchal 

 formerly swarmed, and by devouring their 

 young it has much diminished the number of 

 lizards, which do great damage to the ripe 

 grapes in the vintage season. 



Of more agreeable insects, we are favoured 



170 



