100 ANTS AND ANT LIFE. 



flags over their heads. The door of the nest was opened for 

 each excursion, and then closed again by the help of dry 

 twigs, leaves, and other rubbish. The chief work was done 

 by the larger, the lighter by the smaller individuals, or 

 " castes." The opening and closing of the nest was per- 

 formed, as a rule, mornings and evenings, at a regular hour 

 and in regular succession. McCook also observed a systematic 

 division of labor in the leaf-cutting and the carrying away 

 of the pieces, the " soldiers " only acting as guards aud as 

 leaders. Trees with thin leaves were preferred by the wise 

 little animals, and the leaves were made into a kind of paper- 

 like mass, in the interior of the nest, by means of their jaws 

 and their saliva, so as to serve for building the nest and for 

 the making of single cells or larval chambers. Possibly 

 they live on the juices of the leaves. The larva? are cared 

 for, and the mining or working in the earth is chiefly done, 

 by the smaller individuals or castes, the so-called minors, 

 while the larger ones do the outside work and are helped in 

 the daily opening and shutting of the doors by the smallest 

 ones. These smallest ants are, according to McCook, very 

 brave and often do yeoman's service to the large-headed 

 soldiers. 



The subterranean workers of this remarkable genus are 

 very clever. The Rev. H. Clark reports from Rio de 

 Janeiro, that the Sa-ubas have made a regular tunnel under 

 the bed of the river Parahyba, which is there as broad as 

 the Thames at London, in order to reach a storehouse which 

 is on the opposite bank. Bates tells us that close to the 

 Magoary rice-mills, near Para, the ants bored through the 

 dam of a large reservoir, and the water escaped before the 

 mischief could be remedied. In the Para Botanical Gar- 

 dens an enterprising French gardener did everything he 

 could to drive the Sa-ubas away. He lit fires at the chief 

 entrances of their nests, and blew sulphur vapor into their 

 galleries by means of bellows. But how astonished was 

 Bates when he saw the vapor come out at no less a distance 

 than seventy yards ! Such an extension have the subterra- 

 nean passages of the Sa-ubas. 



Ants which have invaded houses and settled therein are 

 attacked in Brazil by the so-called u Ant-master " in similar 

 fashion ; he pumps smoke into their passages to kill them, 

 after he has stopped up all the outlets. As soon as the ants 



