OCR Text |
Show HOW ANTS MAKE SLAVES, Wfcrrlon Make RatiU AfcalnU NeiU of tho Smiill Tart Ant. Tho warrlcr nnt Is a slave-maktnif species. If. is a large red ant, and It makes raids against nests of tho small yellow turf ant," a mild and docile raco, largo numbors of which It "arrles pll to act as servants. But It docs not steal fully grown turf ants; their habits hab-its aro formed and they wov'd bo useless use-less for such a purpose. What tho warrior ant wants Is a raw material, which pan "bo turned Into thoroughly tyoU trained servants. So It mcroly kills tho. adult ants which strlvo to oppose Its' aggression, and contents Itself It-self with trundling homo to Us own nest tho larvao and pupao of tho turl ants which It has put to lllght and vanquished. van-quished. In time thc3o grubs and cocoons co-coons produco full grown yellow workers, work-ers, which can bo taught by the warrior war-rior ants to act as nurses and housemaids. house-maids. I once saw In a gnrden In Algiers Al-giers a great pitched battle going on between slavemakers and tho family of tho futuro slaves, In which tho round was strewn with tho corpses of tho vanquished. Not till the nest of tho smaller ant3 was almost exterminated extermin-ated did they retlro from tho unequal contest and allow the proud Invader to carry off tholr brothers and sisters In their cocoons, asleep and unconscious. Occasionally, by dint of mere numbers, they beat off the Invader with heavy loss; but much more often the largo and strong-Jawed warriors, and destroy to a worker tho opposing op-posing forces, They crush their adversaries' ad-versaries' heads with their vlso-llko mandibles. Meanwhile, within the nest the other half of the workers the division di-vision told off as special nurses aro otberwiso employed In defending and protecting tho rising generation. At the first alarm, at tho first watchword pasted with waving antcnao through, tho nest, "A warrior host is attacking us!" they hurry to the chambers whero tho cocoons aro stored and bear them oft in their mouths into tho recesses of the nest, tho lowest and most Inaccessible Inacces-sible of all tho chambers. Strand Magazine |