68 EDGE OF THE JUNGLE 
Now that I had the opportunity of quietly 
watching the long, hurrying columns, I came 
hour by hour to feel a greater intimacy, a deeper 
enthusiasm for their vigor of existence, their un- 
failing life at the highest point of possibility of 
achievement. In every direction my former des- 
ultory observations were discounted by still 
greater accomplishments. Elsewhere I have re- 
corded the average speed as two and a half feet 
in ten seconds, estimating this as a mile in three 
and a half hours. An observant colonel in the 
American army has laid bare my congenitally 
hopeless mathematical inaccuracy, and corrected 
this to five hours and fifty-two seconds. Now, 
however, I established a wholly new record for 
the straight-away dash for home of the army ants. 
With the handicap of gravity pulling them down, 
the ants, both laden and unburdened, averaged 
ten feet in twenty seconds, as they raced up the 
post. I have now called in an artist and an 
astronomer to verify my results, these two being 
the only living beings within hailing distance as I 
write, except a baby red howling monkey curled 
up in my lap, and a toucan, sloth, and green boa, 
beyond my laboratory table. Our results are 
identical, and I can safely announce that the 
