THE ARMY ANTS’ HOME TOWN 81 
and again through the mandibles; while the last 
performance was to turn over on their backs and 
roll from side to side, exactly as a horse or don- 
key loves to do. 
One ant, I remember, seemed to have some- 
thing seriously wrong. It sat up on its bent- 
under abdomen in a most comical fashion, and 
was the object of solicitude of every passing ant. 
Sometimes there were thirty in a dense group, 
pushing and jostling; and, like most of our city 
crowds, many seemed to stop only long enough 
to have a moment’s morbid sight, or to ask some 
silly question as to the trouble, then to hurry on. 
Others remained, and licked and twiddled him 
with their antenne for a long time. He was 
in this position for at least twenty minutes. My 
curiosity was so aroused that I gathered him up 
in a vial, whereat he became wildly excited and 
promptly regained full use of his legs and facul- 
ties. Later, when I examined him under the 
lens, I could find nothing whatever wrong. 
Off at one side of the general cleaning and 
reconstruction areas was a pitiful assemblage of 
cripples which had had enough energy to crawl 
back, but which did not attempt, or were not 
allowed, to enter the nest proper. Some had 
