ANTS AND ANT LIFE. 95 



and forwards under its shelter. This method of road 

 making is specially used by the driver or marching ants 

 of West Africa (Annomma arcen^, which are very sensitive 

 to the burning rays of the African sun, and therefore 



fjnerally work during night or under a cloudy sky. 

 hey have no fixed abode, and do no regular building, but 

 seek shelter under hollow tree-roots, overhanging rocks, and 

 other shady places. They march quite regularly through 

 the African woods in large closed columns two inches wide, 

 and seize all living things that they find on their way. They 

 are therefore a much dreaded plague. The ants laden with 

 food or larvae keep in the midst of the ranks, while outside 

 or on either flank march the soldiers, or officers that is, 

 individuals with enormously large heads and powerful jaws, 

 -which carry no burdens but only watch over the order and 

 safety of the column, act as scouts, bring in runaways or 

 laggards, and defy any attack. Very rarely, however, does 

 either man or beast venture upon one. 



If it chances to one of these processions to be delayed in the 

 open until late in the morning, either by rich booty or by 

 other hindrance, the travellers quickly cover their path with 

 tin arched roof of earth or dirt, moulded together with 

 saliva. If long grass, on the other hand, yields them suf- 

 ficient shelter against the destructive sunrays they cease 

 this work. These ants live by making marauding excur- 

 sions, and they take their name from the fact that they drive 

 all living things before them. Even large animals suffer 

 from their attacks, and it is said by the natives that the boa- 

 constrictors, when they have crushed their victim in their 

 deadly coils, before they begin to devour it search over a 

 wide circle of at least a quarter of a mile in diameter, in 

 order to see if an army of driver ants is on the march : if 

 one is near they glide away and leave their prey to the ants. 

 These suck the liquid juices from slain animals and then pull 

 the flesh, piece by piece, into their hiding place. If, during 

 their nightly marches they penetrate into a human abode, 

 it only remains for the dwellers to take to their heels and 

 fly at once, and this is done the more willingly as all the 

 vermin previously settled in the house, such as rats, mice, 

 snakes, lizards, cockroaches, spiders, bugs, etc., are totally 

 destroyed by the ants. It is true that pigs, fowls, etc., that 

 have been left behind by forgetf ulness or lack of time also fall 



