Chapter 19

"The heat was affecting my head. I felt fretful, irritable. Why didn't somebody do something to help me? But what? My teeth chattered, a nervous chill shook me, and the bees buzzed at my shaking.

"The voices behind me stopped. Something was about to happen. I listened. Feet came stealing cautiously along the beam. What was going on?

"'Sit perfectly still.'

"It was Lancy's voice. What was he trying to do? I felt a consuming curiosity, but dared not turn my head. His voice came again:

"'Take a full breath; then shut your mouth.'

"What in the world had my mouth got to do with it? But I obeyed.

"A penetrating sulphurous scent stole through the thick air. Then right under my bee-swollen feet swung a small black kettle, suspended by a chain round its bail, and filled with a yellowish substance, burning bluely. It was brimstone, of which we had a supply for fastening bolts in the rocks. Lancy was trying to smoke the bees off.

"Back oscillated the kettle out of my sight. But the swarm had got the benefit of its contents and didn't like them. An ominous buzzing rose. Their wings lifted, then settled back. The scent was not strong enough to start them.

"I took another full breath. To me the strangling fumes had been sweet for the relief they promised. Once more the kettle swung under me, this time remaining a little longer. The smell was strong; with difficulty I repressed a coughing that threatened to shake me.

"This time the outer layer of bees rose slightly and hovered over the others. Some flew wildly and angrily about. A few dropped, stupefied. It would evidently take but little more to start the whole swarm. Lancy moved up close behind me.

"Again he swung the kettle under the bees. They had had enough. The entire mass left my legs. The greater number dropped down and hung a few feet below, but stray skirmishers flew confusedly about.

"So far, however, not a single bee had touched either of us. It looked as if we were to escape unharmed.

"Suddenly an unexpected disaster happened. One end of the bail pulled out, allowing the kettle to tilt down sidewise. Out fell the sulphur in a blue-burning, smoky stream. A moment later the chain slipped entirely off the bail; the kettle shot downward, leaving only a vanishing scent and a swarm of infuriated bees.

"Lancy grabbed my shoulder.

"'Quick! For your life!'

"I didn't need any urging; but I was stiff and slightly dizzy from the fumes, and it took me several seconds to get to my feet on the beam. Unfortunately, too, I crushed three or four bees that Were crawling stupidly on the steel.

"Then it seemed as if the whole swarm struck me at once. The sulphur may have half-stupefied them, but they hadn't forgotten how to sting.

"I'll never forget my walk along that narrow beam to the bank. The bees were all over me in a moment. My hands and face felt as if they were being punctured with red-hot splinters. Before I'd gone ten steps my eyes were closed so tight I couldn't see.

"I'd have gone off the beam head first if it hadn't been for Lancy. He had on gloves, and mosquito-netting over his head. But they crawled up his sleeves and down his neck, and stung him bad. Yet he didn't falter. With one hand stretched back and grasping mine, he walked cool and straight for the bank, as if he'd been on solid ground, instead of two hundred feet in the air.

"Blind and almost crazy from the stings, I stumbled along behind him. Every step was agony. I was almost tempted to jump from the beam and go down to be crushed to pulp on the boulders. The only thing that saved me was Lancy's hand, cool, firm and strong.

"'Steady! Steady!' he kept saying. I heard him through the shooting, burning pains, and it saved my reason. At last it didn't seem as if I could take another step.

"'Let go!' I cried, trying to get my hand loose; but he dragged me on.

"'In a minute,' said he; and all at once I felt the earth under my feet.

"I wasn't so far gone but I gave the hand I'd been holding a grip that squeezed the fingers together. It was all the thanks I could offer just then. Lancy squeezed back. Then everybody turned to and helped fight the bees off us.

"It was weeks before I got over those stings. Lancy had suffered, too, but of course not so badly. I don't know that he ever knew why I gripped his hand so hard. I was too much ashamed to tell him of the grudge I'd held. But I do know that after that I looked on him as one of my best friends. He'd saved my life, and a friend can't do much more for you than that."

THE INTELLIGENCE OF ANTS

By Sir John Lubbock

The subject of ants is a wide one, for there are at least a thousand species of ants, no two of which have the same habits. In this country (England) we have rather more than thirty, most of which I have kept in confinement. Their life is comparatively long: I have had working ants which were seven years old, and a queen ant lived in one of my nests for fifteen years. The community consists, in addition to the young, of males, which do no work, of wingless workers, and one or more queen mothers, who have at first wings, which, however, after one marriage flight, they throw off, as they never leave the nest again, and in it wings would of course be useless. The workers do not, except occasionally, lay eggs, but carry on all the affairs of the community. Some of them, and especially the younger ones, remain in the nest, excavate chambers and tunnels, and tend the young, which are sorted up according to age, so that my nests often had the appearance of a school, with the children arranged in classes. In our English ants the workers in each species are all similar except in size, but among foreign species there are some in which there are two or even more classes of workers, differing greatly not only in size, but also in form. The differences are not the result of age nor of race, but are adaptations to different functions, the nature of which, however, is not yet well understood. Among the Termites, those of one class certainly seem to act as soldiers, and among the true ants also some have comparatively immense heads and powerful jaws. It is doubtful, however, whether they form a real army. Bates observed that on a foraging expedition the large-headed individuals did not walk in the regular ranks, nor on the return did they carry any of the booty, but marched along at the side, and at tolerably regular intervals, "like subaltern officers in a marching regiment."

Solomon was, so far as we yet know, quite correct in describing ants as having "neither guide, overseer, nor ruler." The so-called queens are really mothers. Nevertheless it is true, and it is curious, that the working ants and bees always turn their heads towards the queen. It seems as if the sight of her gives them pleasure. On one occasion, while moving some ants from one nest into another for exhibition at the Royal Institution, I unfortunately crushed the queen and killed her. The others, however, did not desert her, or draw her out as they do dead workers, but on the contrary carried her into the new nest, and subsequently into a larger one with which I supplied them, congregating round her for weeks just as if she had been alive. One could hardly help fancying that they were mourning her loss, or hoping anxiously for her recovery.

The communities of ants are sometimes very large, numbering even up to 500,000 individuals; and it is a lesson to us, that no one has ever yet seen a quarrel between any two ants belonging to the same community. On the other hand, it must be admitted that they are in hostility, not only with most other insects, including ants of different species, but even with those of the same species if belonging to different communities. I have over and over again introduced ants from one of my nests into another nest of the same species, and they were invariably attacked, seized by a leg or an antenna, and dragged out.

It is evident therefore that the ants of each community all recognize one another, which is very remarkable. But more than this, I several times divided a nest into two halves, and found that even after a separation of a year and nine months they recognized one another, and were perfectly friendly; while they at once attacked ants from a different nest, although of the same species.

It has been suggested that the ants of each nest have some sign or password by which they recognize one another. To test this I made some insensible. First I tried chloroform, but this was fatal to them; and as therefore they were practically dead, I did not consider the test satisfactory. I decided therefore to intoxicate them. This was less easy than I had expected. None of my ants would voluntarily degrade themselves by getting drunk. However, I got over the difficulty by putting them into whisky for a few moments. I took fifty specimens, twenty-five from one nest and twenty-five from another, made them dead drunk, marked each with a spot of paint, and put them on a table close to where the other ants from one of the nests were feeding. The table was surrounded as usual with a moat of water to prevent them from straying. The ants which were feeding soon noticed those which I had made drunk. They seemed quite astonished to find their comrades in such disgraceful condition, and as much at a loss to know what to do with their drunkards as we are. After a while, however, to cut my story short, they carried them all away: the strangers they took to edge of the moat and dropped into the water, while they bore their friends home into the nest, where by degrees they slept off the effects of the spirit. Thus it is evident that they know their friends even when incapable of giving any sign or password.

This little experiment also shows that they help comrades in distress. If a wolf or a rook be ill or injured, we are told that it is driven away or even killed by its comrades. Not so with ants. For instance, in one of my nests an unfortunate ant, in emerging from the chrysalis skin, injured her legs so much that she lay on her back quite helpless. For three months, however, she was carefully fed and tended by the other ants. In another case an ant in the same manner had injured her antennae. I watched her also carefully to see what would happen. For some days she did not leave the nest. At last one day she ventured outside, and after a while met a stranger ant of the same species, but belonging to another nest, by whom she was at once attacked. I tried to separate them, but whether by her enemy, or perhaps by my well-meant but clumsy kindness, she was evidently much hurt and lay helplessly on her side. Several others passed her without taking any notice, but soon one came up, examined her carefully with her antennae, and carried her off tenderly to the nest. No one, I think, who saw it could have denied to that ant one attribute of humanity, the quality of kindness.

The existence of such communities as those of ants or bees implies, no doubt, some power of communication, but the amount is still a matter of doubt. It is well known that if one bee or ant discovers a store of food, others soon find their way to it. This, however, does not prove much. It makes all the difference whether they are brought or sent. If they merely accompany on her return a companion who has brought a store of food, it does not imply much. To test this, therefore, I made several experiments. For instance, one cold day my ants were almost all in their nests. One only was out hunting and about six feet from home. I took a dead bluebottle fly, pinned it on to a piece of cork, and put it down just in front of her. She at once tried to carry off the fly, but to her surprise found it immovable. She tugged and tugged, first one way and then another for about twenty minutes, and then went straight off to the nest. During that time not a single ant had come out; in fact she was the only ant of that nest out at the time. She went straight in, but in a few seconds--less than half a minute--came out again with no less than twelve friends, who trooped off with her, and eventually tore up the dead fly, carrying it off in triumph.

Now the first ant took nothing home with her; she must therefore somehow have made her friends understand that she had found some food, and wanted them to come and help her to secure it. In all such cases, however, so far as my experience goes, the ants brought their friends, and some of my experiments indicated that they are unable to send them.

Certain species of ants, again, make slaves of others, as Huber first observed. If a colony of the slave-making ants is changing the nest, a matter which is left to the discretion of the slaves, the latter carry their mistresses to their new home. Again, if I uncovered one of my nests of the Fuscous ant (Formica fusca), they all began running about in search of some place of refuge. If now I covered over one small part of the nest, after a while some ant discovered it. In such a case, however, the brave little insect never remained there, she came out in search of her friends, and the first one she met she took up in her jaws, threw over her shoulder (their way of carrying friends), and took into the covered part; then both came out again, found two more friends and brought them in, the same manoeuvre being repeated until the whole community was in a place of safety. This I think says much for their public spirit, but it seems to prove that, in F. fusca at least, the powers of communication are but limited.

One kind of slave-making ant has become so completely dependent on their slaves that even if provided with food they will die of hunger, unless there is a slave to put it into their mouths, I found, however, that they would thrive very well if supplied with a slave for an hour or so once a week to clean and feed them.

But in many cases the community does not consist of ants only. They have domestic animals, and indeed it is not going too far to say that they have domesticated more animals than we have. Of these the most important are Aphides on trees and bushes; others collect root-feeding Aphides into their nests. They serve as cows to the ants, which feed on the honey-dew secreted by the Aphides. Not only, moreover, do the ants protect the Aphides themselves, but collect their eggs in autumn, and tend them carefully through the winter, ready for the next spring. Many other insects are also domesticated by ants, and some of them, from living constantly underground, have completely lost their eyes and become quite blind.

When we see a community of ants working together in perfect harmony, it is impossible not to ask ourselves how far they are mere exquisite automatons; how far they are conscious beings. When we watch an ant-hill tenanted by thousands of industrious inhabitants, excavating chambers, forming tunnels, making roads, guarding their home, gathering food, feeding the young, tending their domestic animals--each one fulfilling its duties industriously, and without confusion--it is difficult; altogether to deny to them the gift of reason; and all our recent observations tend to confirm the opinion that their mental powers differ from those of men, not so much in kind as in degree.

THE KATY-DID'S PARTY

By Harriet Beecher Stowe

Miss Katy-did sat on the branch of a flowering azalea, in her best suit of fine green and silver, with wings of point-lace from Mother Nature's finest web.

Miss Katy was in the very highest possible spirits, because her gallant cousin, Colonel Katy-did, had looked in to make her a morning visit. It was a fine morning, too, which goes for as much among the Katy-dids as among men and women. It was, in fact, a morning that Miss Katy thought must have been made on purpose for her to enjoy herself in. There had been a patter of rain the night before, which had kept the leaves awake talking to each other till nearly morning, but by dawn the small winds had blown brisk little puffs, and whisked the heavens clear and bright with their tiny wings, as you have seen Susan clear away the cobwebs in your mamma's parlor; and so now there were only left a thousand blinking, burning water drops, hanging like convex mirrors at the end of each leaf, and Miss Katy admired herself in each one.

"Certainly I am a pretty creature," she said to herself; and when the gallant Colonel said something about being dazzled by her beauty, she only tossed her head and took it as quite a matter of course.

"The fact is, my dear Colonel," she said, "I am thinking of giving a party, and you must help me make out the lists."

"My dear, you make me the happiest of Katy-dids."

"Now," said Miss Katy-did, drawing an azalea-leaf towards her, "let us see,--whom shall we have? The Fireflies, of course; everybody wants them, they are so brilliant; a little unsteady, to be sure, but quite in the higher circles."

"Yes, we must have the Fireflies," echoed the Colonel.

"Well, then,--and the Butterflies and the Moths. Now, there's a trouble. There's such an everlasting tribe of those Moths; and if you invite dull people they're always sure all to come, every one of them. Still, if you have the Butterflies, you can't leave out the Moths."

"Old Mrs. Moth has been laid up lately with a gastric fever, and that may keep two or three of the Misses Moth at home," said the Colonel.

"What ever could give the old lady such a turn?" said Miss Katy. "I thought she never was sick."

"I suspect it's high living. I understand she and her family ate up a whole ermine cape last month, and it disagreed with them."

"For my part, I can't conceive how the Moths can live as they do", said Miss Katy with a face of disgust. "Why, I could no more eat worsted and fur, as they do--"

"That is quite evident from the fairy-like delicacy of your appearance," said the Colonel. "One can see that nothing so gross and material has ever entered into your system."

"I'm sure," said Miss Katy, "mamma says she don't know what does keep me alive; half a dew-drop and a little hit of the nicest part of a rose-leaf, I assure you, often last me for a day. But we are forgetting our list. Let's see,--the Fireflies, Butterflies, Moths. The Bees must come, I suppose."

"The Bees are a worthy family," said the Colonel.

"Worthy enough, but dreadfully hum-drum" said Miss Katy. "They never talk about anything but honey and housekeeping; still they are a class of people one cannot neglect."

"Well, then, there are the Bumble-bees."

"Oh, I doat on them! General Bumble is one of the most dashing, brilliant fellows of the day.

"I think he is shockingly corpulent," said Colonel Katy-did, not at all pleased to hear him praised, "don't you?"

"I don't know but he _is_ a little stout," said Miss Katy; "but so distinguished and elegant in his manners,--something martial and breezy about him."

"Well, if you invite the Bumble-bees you must have the Hornets."

"Those spiteful Hornets,--I detest them!"

"Nevertheless, dear Miss Katy, one does not like to offend the Hornets."

"No, one can't. There are those five Misses Hornet,--dreadful old maids! as full of spite as they can live. You may be sure they will every one come, and be looking about to make spiteful remarks. Put down the Hornets, though."

"How about the Mosquitoes?" said the Colonel.

"Those horrid Mosquitoes,--they are dreadfully common! Can't one cut them?"

"Well, dear Miss Katy," said the Colonel, "if you ask my candid opinion as a friend, I should say _not_. there's young Mosquito, who graduated last year, has gone into literature, and is connected with some of our leading papers, and they say he carries the sharpest pen of all the writers. It won't do to offend him."

"And so I suppose we must have his old aunts, and all six of his sisters, and all his dreadfully common relations."

"It is a pity," said the Colonel, "but one must pay one's tax to society."

Just at this moment the conference was interrupted by a visitor, Miss Keziah Cricket, who came in with her work-bag on her arm to ask a subscription for a poor family of Ants who had just had their house hoed up in clearing the garden-walks.

"How stupid of them," said Katy, "not to know better than to put their house in the garden-walk; that's just like those Ants!"

"Well, they are in great trouble; all their stores destroyed, and their father killed,--cut in two by a hoe."

"How very shocking! I don't like to hear of such disagreeable things,--it affects my nerves terribly. Well, I'm sure I haven't anything to give. Mamma said yesterday she was sure she didn't know how our bills were to be paid,--and there's my green satin with point-lace yet to come home." And Miss Katy-did shrugged her shoulders and affected to be very busy with Colonel Katy-did, in just the way that young ladies sometimes do when they wish to signify to visitors that they had better leave.

Little Miss Cricket perceived how the case stood, and so hopped briskly off, without giving herself even time to be offended. "Poor extravagant little thing!" said she to herself, "it was hardly worth while to ask her."

"Pray, shall you invite the Crickets?" said Colonel Katy-did.

"Who? I? Why, Colonel, what a question! Invite the Crickets? Of what can you be thinking?"

"And shall you not ask the Locusts, or the Grasshoppers?"

"Certainly. The Locusts, of course,--a very old and distinguished family; and the Grasshoppers are pretty well, and ought to be asked. But we must draw the line somewhere,--and the Crickets! Why it's shocking even to think of!"

"I thought they were nice, respectable people."

"O, perfectly nice and respectable,--very good people, in fact, so far as that goes. But then you must see the difficulty."

"My dear cousin, I am afraid you must explain."

"Why, their _color_, to be sure. Don't you see?"

"Oh!" said the Colonel. "That's it, is it? Excuse me, but I have been living in France, where these distinctions are wholly unknown, and I have not yet got myself in the train of fashionable ideas here."

"Well, then, let me teach you," said Miss Katy. "You know we go for no distinctions except those created by Nature herself, and we found our rank upon color, because that is clearly a thing that none has any hand in but our Maker. You see?"

"Yes; but who decides what color shall be the reigning color?"

"I'm surprised to hear the question! The only true color--the only proper one--is _our_ color, to be sure. A lovely pea-green is the precise shade on which to found aristocratic distinction. But then we are liberal;--we associate with the Moths, who are gray; with the Butterflies, who are blue-and-gold colored; with the Grasshoppers, yellow and brown;--and society would become dreadfully mixed if it were not fortunately ordered that the Crickets are black as jet. The fact is, that a class to be looked down upon is necessary to all elegant society, and if the Crickets were not black, we could not keep them down, because, as everybody knows, they are often a great deal cleverer than we are. They have a vast talent for music and dancing; they are very quick at learning, and would be getting to the very top of the ladder if we once allowed them to climb. But being black is a convenience, --because, as long as we are green and they are black, we have a superiority that can never be taken from us. Don't you see now?"

"Oh, yes, I see exactly," said the Colonel.

"Now that Keziah Cricket, who just came in here, is quite a musician, and her old father plays the violin beautifully; by the way, we might engage him for our orchestra."