IN FEATHERS AND FUR. 205 
He's a very slow fellow to get about ; indeed, some people say 
he can't go any way except backwards, and he'd starve to death if 
he depended on his speed, especially as his favorite food consists of 
ants — about as lively little fellows as I know of. But the little 
hunter is far too wise to lose his dinner by expecting to catch it on 
the run. He sets a trap — that is to say, he digs a deep pit, with 
steep sides, and when it is done, he buries himself at the bottom 
of it, with, only his jaws sticking out. See him in the picture. 
There he waits for his game, and he has not long to wait either, for 
generally in a few minutes some thoughtless little fellow, hunting 
for food, looks over the edge of the pit to see if possibly some nice 
bit of meat might be there. He sees no meat, but the slippery 
sand begins to roll out from under his feet, and before he knows it 
he finds himself at the bottom of the pit, and in the jaws of the 
cunning hunter. So, instead of finding his own dinner, he becomes 
a dinner for his enemy. 
This hunter is a droll little fellow, and though he has a per- 
fectly monstrous name, with no less than twenty letters in it, he 
isn't so big as the end of your little finger, and when you come to 
know the meaning of his long name, that isn't so very big either — 
only Ant Lion. You see him at the left of the picture. 
Though a short name, it is rather a high-sounding one for a fat 
little grub not half an inch long, isn't it ? But I assure you he 
deserves it, for no lion ever was more terrible to man, than this 
tiny bit of a grub is to the ants and other small creatures on which 
it feeds. 
There are several curious things about him, besides his way of 
getting his dinner. To begin with, though he has six legs, like all 
insects, they are all very weak, and not of much use to him, 
excepting the two hind ones, with which he drags himself about 
backwards, as I said. Think of going backwards all your life ! 
Another odd thing, is the way he makes his pit. He selects a 
sandy plane, as free from stones as possible, and then proceeds to 
make the pit by dragging himself around in a circle, and throwing 
the sand out with his flat head, which makes a very good shovel. 
When he gets around once, he goes on to make a second ring, 
inside of the first, a little deeper, and so he goes on, making his 
circle smaller and deeper, till it is done, and he has taken his place 
under the loose sand at the bottom. Ants are his usual prey — as 
I said — but he will not refuse other food, and if a small beetle, or 
