382 
LION-ANT. 
the bottom of the pit, watching for prey ; and, what 
is very extraordinary, will fast during the time. 
These insects are enabled to abstain from food 
for a great length of time : one of them has 
been known to live above six months in a box ex- 
actly closed up, where he had. no other accommo- 
dation than sand. We must conclude that this 
temporary fasting is not exactly to the creature’s 
mind ; for, when plenty of game falls into the pit, 
he attacks it most voraciously, and at the same time 
shows a very malignant spirit, since he will leave 
one insect half devoured to kill any other that may 
be within his reach. 
When this insect is about to pass into the state 
of a chrysalis, previous to appearing in his last form, 
he no longer troubles himself with his pit, but be- 
gins to work in the sand, where he strikes a multi- 
tude of irregular tracks, and becomes so agitated 
that his body is covered with a viscous humour: after 
these violent workings have continued some time, 
he plunges into the sand, and unites all the grains 
he touches by means of the glutinous fluid with 
which he is covered. 
With these sandy particles, and the dried glue 
that consolidates them, he forms a crust which en- 
compasses his whole body, like a little ball of about 
half an inch in diameter, in which the animal re- 
serves himself a competent space for motion. He 
is not satisfied with a bare wall, which would inevi- 
tably chill him, but spins out of his own bowels a 
thread, which in fineness infinitely surpasses that 
