River Falls journal. [volume] (River Falls, Pierce County, Wis.) 1872-2019, 1895-02-07
THE ANT MAN.
A Useful Individual In the Tropics Who
Fights the Insect With Smoke.

A Useful Individual In the Tropics Who
Fights the Insect With Smoke.
To look at the mild, timid ants of
our cool climates, which run at the
sight or sound of people, build their
humble nests under a stone or the
roots of trees. and contend themselves
with gentlemanly little thefts OF seeds
or grain, or such small matters, to look
al these gentlemanly little fellows you
would never imagine that there are
some branches of their family, distinct
cousins, who are fierce in the pursuit
of their human neighbors' goods, so
strong and so intelligent that even
grown men are afraid OF them, and
sometimes whole villages turn out to
fight them. But it is SO, and these
eyes of mine have looked upon them
and their ruthless doings.
The formiga, as the destroyer is
called, constructs a citadel for itself
underground, its only communication
with the world above being by secret
passages. If it can find any wood-lice
Whereabouts it captures and carries
them home, makes yard for them, a
veritable farm yard, and keeps them,
content by furnishing a supply of
fresh leaves every day, just for all the
world as we feed our farm stock. The
formiga is marauder of its own
kindred. too. making raids on its weak
er cousins and bearing Off their eggs,
which, in due course of Matching, be-
come the slaves of their captors.
Usually the people of those tropical
regions pay little attention to the do
ings of the formiga. They come and
go as they list. running over the rooms,
tables, dishes; they are fshed out of
the butter, tapped ont of the bread
and cake. 1t is all a matter of course.
But when these sturdy little fellows
invade the house in swarms, and n
warm eception-boiling waterfalls
to diminish the nuisance, then the SER
vice of the ant man becomes necessary
and he is sent for in hot haste. His
stock in trade is an enormous bellows,
and a load of a certain kind of wood
found in the neighboring forests. At
ter stopping up all the openings lead
ing under the house, except central
one, he enlarges that and forms it into
a furnace that will admit the pipe of
the bellows.
Then he lights a fire, and with the
aid of the great bellows forces the
smoke into the ant cidatel under the
surface of the ground. OF course these
are very porous, and when the smoke
passes through them it goes out into
the house above. Then the ant man
leaves an assistant TO work the bellows
and, going into the house, stops up
every aperture and crack that he can
find.
Meanwhile there is wild commotion
among these doomed insects whose
home is being bombarded with smoke.
They understand their danger with the
very first puff that reaches them, and
know that their only hope is in fight.
They all hasten to the central cham
Der. where their precious eggs are
stored. At a given signal from their
chief each one seizes an egg. then all
turn in haste into the subterranean
passages that lead into the garden, de-
sorting their homes and carefully
stored stock of provisions, but holding
fast to the treasured eggs.
But there before them are cruel
wreaths of blue smoke. They turn and
rush to another passage. The same
thing there. AS forlorn hope the
poor ants-we can't help feeling sorry
for them, after all-run into the old
deserted galleries. or set to work to
make new ones, hoping their enemy
will not find them there at least.
But the ant man is patrolling the
grounds around the house. As the old
or new galleries are cleared out by the
brave little ants the smoke penetrates
them and comes to the surface in
thin wreath. They are thus betrayed
as well as s,nothered, and a stroke of
the spade ends their frantic efforts to
escape.
All this time fresh quantities of the
hot smoke are being forced through
their highways and byways, and the
frail bodies of the formiga are shrivel-
ling and dropping along their line of at
tempted retreat Soon they cease to
struggle. They can not breathe the
rarified, smoke-laden air. The next
day when the soil has cooled off, they
are found calcined in their once busy
galleries, their roasted eggs at their
sides. Poor little creatures!
But their human victims call the ant
man blessing. Times.