84 EDGE OF THE JUNGLE 



immature larva ; but there was left in the corner 

 of the flat board a swarm of about one-quarter 

 of the entire number, enshrouding a host of older 

 larvae. The cleaning zones, the cripples' gather- 

 ing-room, all had given way to new activities, on 

 the flat board, down near the kitchen middens, 

 and in every horizontal crack. 



The cause of all this strange excitement, this 

 braving of the terrible dangers of fumes which 

 had threatened to destroy the entire colony the 

 night before, suddenly was made plain as I 

 watched. A critical time was at hand in the lives 

 of the all-precious larvaa, when they could not 

 be moved the period of spinning, of beginning 

 the transformation from larvae to pupa?. This 

 evidently was an operation which had to take 

 place outside the nest and demanded some sort 

 of light covering. On the flat board were sev- 

 eral thousand ants and a dozen or more groups 

 of full-grown larvae. Workers of all sizes were 

 searching everywhere for some covering for the 

 tender immature creatures. They had chewed 

 up all available loose splinters of wood, and near 

 the rotten, termite-eaten ends, the sound of doz- 

 ens of jaws gnawing all at once was plainly audi- 

 ble. This unaccustomed, unmilitary labor pro- 



