Green-Mountain freeman. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1844-1884, 1880-06-23
Mark Twain on Ants.

'ho'h A"hih Ou anus
Mark Twain. in his recent work. de-
scribes the houses # the Black forest, in
valleys, streams, watermills, and way
side crucixes, and saints and virgins; its
human inhabitants. Ofone of its other
inhabitants" the ant, here is a singulary
felicitious and amusing sketch: Now
and then while we rested. we watched the
lab0rious ant in his work. ! found nothing
new in him-certainly nothing to change
my opinion of him. 1t seems to me that
in the matter Of intellect the ant must be
a strangely overrated bird. During many
summers now have watched him when |
ought to buve been in better business, and
have not yet come across living ant
that seemed to have any more sense than
a dead one. refer to the ordinary ant, of
course. ] have no experience of those
wonderful Swiss and African ones which
vote, keep drilled armies, hold slaves and
dispute about religion. Those particular
ants may be all that the naturalist paints
them, but am persuaded that the average
ant is Il sham. ! admit his industry, of
course, he is n Woodworking creature
when anybody is looking-but his leather
headeadess is the point l make against
him. He goes out foraging, he makes
capture, and then what does he do? Go
home? No; lie goes anywhere but home.
He doesn't know where home is. His
home may be only three feet away; no
matter, he can't find it. He makes his
capture as | have said; it: is generally
something which can be no sort of use 10
himself Or any body else, it is usually
seven times bigger than it ought to be, he
hunts out the awkwardest place to take
hold of it, he lifts it bodily up in the air by
main force, and starts-not towards home,
but in the opposite direction, not calmly
and wisely, but with a frantic haste which
is wasteful of his strength, he fetches up
against Il pebble, and, instead of going
around ii, lie climbs over it backwards
dragging his booty after him. tumbles
down the other side, jumps up in a pas
sion, kicks the dust off his clothes,
viciousy, yanks it this way, and then that,
shoves it ahead Of him moment, turns
tail and lugs it after him another moment,
gets madder and madder, then presently
hOlsts it into the air and goes tearing
away in an entirely new direction. comes
to Il weed and it never occurs to him that
he can go round it; no, he must climb it,
and he does climb it, dragging his worth
less property to the top which is as wise
Il thing to do as it would be for me to car
ry II sack of flour from Heidelburg TO
Paris by way of Strasburg steeple. When
he gels up there he finds that it is not the
place, takes II cursory glance at the scene
ry, and either climbs down again or tum-
bles down and starts off once more-as
usual in Il new direction.
At the end Of half on hour he fetches up
within six inches of the place he started
from, and lays his burden down. Mean,
time he has been over all the ground for
two yards around, and climbed all the
weeds and pebbles he came across. Now
he wipes the sweat from his brow. strokes
his limbs and then marches aimlcSsly off
he traverses good deal of zigztg country,
and by-and-by stumbles on the same booty
again. He does not remember to have
ever seen it before, he looks around to see
which is not the way home, grabs his
bundle, and starts. He goes through the
same adventures he had before, finally
stops to rest, and Il friend comes along.
Evidently the freng remarks that II last
years grasshopper leg is a very noble
acquisition, and inquiries where he got it..
Evidently the proprietor does not remem-
Der exactly where he did get it but thinks
he got it "around here somewhere" Evi-
IDENTIFY the friend contracts to help him to
freight it home. Then with judgment
peculiarly antic (pun not Intentionally, they
take hold of the opposite ends of that grass
hopper leg and begin to tug with all their
might in opposite directions. Presently
they take rest, Land confer together. They
decide that something is wrong, they can't
make out what. Then they 90 at it again
Just us before Same result. Mutual re-
examinations follow. Evidently each ac-
They warm up, and the dispute ends in a
| fight. They lock themselves together and
chew each u.her's jaws for while, then
they roll and tumble on the ground till
one looses horn or a leg and has to haul
off for repairs. They make up and go to
work in the same old insane way, but the
crippled ant is at disadvantage, tug us
he may the other one drags Oft the booty
and him ut the end of it. Instead of giving
up he hangs on and gets his shins bruised
against every obstruction that comes in the
way. By-and-by, when that grasshopper
leg has been dragged all over the same
old ground once more, it is finally dumped
at about the spot where it originally lay.
The two perspring ants inspect it thought.
fully and decide that dried grasshopper
legs are poor sort of property after all,
aud then each starts off in different di-
recton to see if he can't find an old nail
or something else that is heavy enough to
afford entertainment and at the same time
valueless enough to mak9 an ant want to
own it.