ANTS — WARS. 
75 
would bring back to the colony a thousand pupae or larvae. 
On the whole, the number of future slaves stolen by a strong 
colony during a favourable summer may be reckoned at forty 
thousand ! 
The internecine battles which occasionally break out 
among the Amazons themselves are naturally the most cruel. 
They tear each other to pieces with incredible fury, and knots 
of five or six individuals which have pierced each ocher may be 
seen rolling over each other on the ground, it being impos- 
sible to distinguish between friend and foe. Civil wars among 
men are also known to be the most embittered and the most 
bloody. 
The mode of attack practised by the other best known 
species of slave-making ant, sanguined , is somewhat 
different : — 
They march in small troops which, in case of need, summon 
reinforcements, and therefore as a rule only reach their goal 
slowly. Between the individual troops messengers or scouts 
run continually backwards and forwards. The first troop 
which arrives at the hostile nest does not rush at it, as do the 
Amazons, but contents itself with making provisional re- 
connaissances, wherein some of the assailants are generally 
made prisoners by the enemy, which have time to bethink 
and to collect themselves. Reinforcements are now brought 
up, and a regular siege of the nest begins. A sudden invasion, 
like that of the Amazons, is never seen. The besieging army 
forms a complete ring round the hostile nest, and the besiegers 
hold this with mandibles open and antennae drawn back, with- 
out going nearer. In this position they beat off all assaults of 
the besieged, until they feel themselves strong enough to advance 
to the attack. This attack scarcely ever fails, and has for its 
chief object the mastering of the entrances and outlets of the 
nest. A special troop guards each opening, and only allows 
such of the besieged to pass out as carry no pupae. This man- 
oeuvre gives rise to a number of comical and characteristic 
scenes. By this means the sanguine ants in a few minutes manage 
to have all the defenders out of the nests and the pupae left 
behind. This is the case at least with the rufibarbes , while 
the rather less timid fuscce try, even at the last moment when 
it is useless, to stop up or barricade the entrances. The sanguine 
ants do not indeed possess the terrible weapons and the warlike 
impetuosity of the Amazons, but they are stronger and larger. 
If a fusea or a rufibarbis fights with a sanguine ant for the peg- 
