Weekly Chillicothe crisis. (Chillicothe, Livingston Co., Mo.) 1878-19??, 1880-06-03

Now and then, while we rested, W
watched the laborious ant at his work.
found nothing new in him-certainl
nothing to change my opinion of him. |
seems to me that in the matter of intelleC
the ant must be strangely overrate,
bird. During many summers now hav
watched him when | ought to have beci
in better business, and have not yet COM
across living ant that seemed to hav
any more sense than dead one. refe
to the ordinary ant, OF course; | have hat
no experience OF those wonderful Swls
and African ones which vote, keep drille,
armies, hold slaves, and dispute about e
ligion. Those particular ants may be al
that the naturalist paints them, but an
persuaded that the average ant is n sham
admit his industry, of course; he is tn,
hardest working creature in the world
Iwhen anybody is looking-but his leather
heatedness is the point | make agains
him. He goes out tOraglng; he makes {
capture, and then what does he doP &c
homer No; he goes anywhere but home
He doesn't know where home is. Hi
lcGle may be only three feet away; NJ
matter, he cant find it.
He makes his capture, as have said; il
is generally something which can be OF nc
sort of use to himself or any body else; it i,
usually seven times bigger than it ought
to be; he hunts out the awkwardcst place
to take hold of it; he lifts 1t bodily up in
the air 10y main force, and starts-not
toward home, but in the opposite direc.
ton; not calmly and wisely, but with a
frantic haste which Is wastetul of his
strength; he fetches up against a pebble,
and instead Of going around it, he climbs
overit backwards, dragging his booty after
him, tumbles down the other side.
jumps up IN passion, kicks the dust off
his clothes, mostens bis hands, grabs his
property viciously, yanks it this way, then
that, shOves it ahead of him a moment,
turns tail and lugs it after him another
moment, gets madder and madder, then
presently hoiSts it into the air and goes
tearing away in an entirely new direction;
comes to weed; it never occurs to him to
60 round it. No; he must climb it, and
he does climb it, dragging his worthless
property to the top-which is as bright Il
thing to do as it would be for ME to carry
a sack of -four from Heidelberg to Paris by
way Of Strasburg steeple; when be gets
there he finds that that Is not the place;
takes cursOry glance at the scenery, and
either climbs down again or tumbles down
and starts of once morc--as usual, in a
new direction.
At the end of half an hour he fptches 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 limrs, ard then marches aimles'ly off,
in as violent a hurry as ever He trav-
erses a good deal Of zig.Eag country. and
by and by stumbles on his 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 bun
die and starts. He goes through the same
adventure he had before, finally stops to
rest and friend comes along. Evidently
the friend remarks that q last years ;rasS-
hopper leg is verv noble acquisition, and
inquiries where he got it. Evidently the
does not remember exactly
where he did get it, but thinks he got 1t
"around here somewhere" Evidently
the friend contracts to help him froight
it home. Then with a judgment pc, liar
y antic (pun not intentiOnal), they take
hold Of opposite ends of that grasshopper
leg and begin to tug with all their might
in opposite directions. Presently they
take a rest and confer together. They de.
eide that something is wrong, they can't
make out what. Then they 90 at it again,
Just as before. Same result. Mutual re.
follow. Evidently each ac.
luscs the other of being an obstructlOnist.
they warm up, and the dispute ends in a
fight. They lock themselves together and
chew each Others jaws for while; then
hey roll and tumble on the ground till
lne loses horn or leg and has to haul of |
or repairs. They make up and 60 to work |
lgaln in the same insane way, but the
,rippled ant il at a disadvantage; tug as
ne may, the other one drags off the booty
md him at the end of it. Instead of Civ
ng up, he hangs on and gets his shins |
Jruised against every obstruction that
,Omes in the way. By.and-by, when that |
,rasshopper leg has been dragged all over
he same old ground once more, it is final
y dumped at about the same spot where
originally lay. The two pcrspiring ants
inspect 1t thoughttully and decide that |
Tried grasshopper legs are a poorlsort of |
property after all, and then each starts off |
n a different direction to see if he can't |
ind an old nail or something else that is
eavy enough to afford entertainment, and |
t the same time valueless enough to make |
n ant want to own it..