DEPREDATIONS OF ANTS 157 



watching for some days a nest of ant-wrens which con- 

 tained young. Going thither one morning, he found 

 the tree, and the nest itself, swarming with foraging-ants. 

 He at first thought that the fledghngs had been devoured, 

 but he soon saw the parents, only about thirty yards off, 

 with food in their beaks. They were engaged in entering 

 a dense part of the jungle, coming out again without 

 food in their beaks, and soon reappearing once more 

 with food. Miller never found their new nests, but 

 their actions left him certain that they were feeding 

 their young, which they must have themselves removed 

 from the old nest. These ant-wrens hover in front of 

 and over the columns of foraging-ants, feeding not only 

 on the other insects aroused by the ants, but on the ants 

 themselves. This fact has been doubted ; but Miller 

 has shot them with the ants in their bills and in their 

 stomachs. Dragon-flies, in numbers, often hover over 

 the columns, darting down at them ; MiUer could not 

 be certain he had seen them actually seizing the ants, 

 but this was his belief I have myself seen these ants 

 plunder a nest of the dangerous and highly aggressive 

 wasps, while the wasps buzzed about in great excitement, 

 but seemed unable effectively to retaliate. I have also 

 seen them clear a sapling tenanted by their kinsmen, the 

 poisonous red ants, or fire-ants ; the fire-ants fought and 

 I have no doubt injured or killed some of their swarming 

 and active black foes ; but the latter quickly did away 

 with them. I have only come across black foraging- 

 ants ; but there are red species. They attack human 

 beings precisely as they attack all animals, and 

 precipitate flight is the only resort. 



Around our camp here butterflies of gorgeous colour- 

 ing swarmed, and there were many fungi as delicately 

 shaped and tinted as flowers. The scents in the woods 



