The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1897-08-15
ANTS IN BATTLE.
Naturalist Describes War BE
tween Hostile Tribes.

! ell by Sc-tILsLS AuIm.CA Eefculdueas o.
1 whose homely JOYS and destiny obscure
/ We take so Att,e account, is one OF the
/ best fighters In that great word in whose
| drama he pays so innnitesinal part.
! There have been mighty battles on this
terrestrial ball but not the conflicts Of
Tamerlane's tribes with the hosts Of
Western Asia. nor the wars Of the legions
OF Caius julius Caesar with their enemies
Of the north. ever involved So many COM
batants OF resulted in 50 many fatalities
as did a recent battle in Larkspur can
yon, under the shadow Of Tamaipais. II
was var, grim war Waged an day long
and into the evening, and on its conclu-
sion the field was strewn not with thou
sands merely, but with millions of the
slain.
A burning brush heap was in uncom-
Portable proximity to an ant city, and.
| fleeing from their Pompch in frantic
horde, the sleek, back Inhabitants. with
their great white-winged queen and sew
er1l smaller winged princes of the royal
blood, made microscopic tracks along the
cOWpath. A few of the millions of wing
less neuters carried pupae, ana brought
up the rear After a hurried march Of ten
miles, or say thirty feet, the advance
guard came suddenly upon the walls of n
Troy whose people were pursuing their
peaceful industries, some of them carry
ing modulus Of clay from their caverns.
and others bringing in armfus of food
to be consumed by the infant population.
q believe the heretical scientists have de
stroyed the force of SolomOn's sage ad-
vice 10 the slothfm to regard the saving
powers Of the ant, by proving that the
creature hibernates in winter and stores
no victuasD The working Trojans were
very active, brushing past each other
with no sort of greeting discernible by
human eyes or ears. and utterly disre-
gardful of the heat Of the day, the news
Of the Victorian jubilee, or the bulling OF
the wheat market. The Greeks on the
other hand, were attending as strictly 20
their marching as though they had close
~ to mind the beats Of a Sousa band
When some OF the outside workers of
the Trojan army were approached by the
leaders Of the Grecian horde there was a
cessation of labor The chunks of clay
were dropped, the wild oaten grains aban-
doned, and there was a quiet, unostenta-
tous advance upon the invaders. There
was twirling of antennae, a yawnlng
OF mandibles, and Trojan met Greek in a
hand-to-hand struggle 10 the death. The
first fencing with the antennae and the
lrst clinch Of the pincer-like jaws upon
neck, back or Les were as combatively
colorless as anything in the way of NOR
N'NAANt
of the matter-of-factness Of real tragedy
as contrasted with the tragedy Of romance
and of drama. No strutting, bOmbastic
hero pointed his sword 20 high heaven and
called upon his deity or yelled 80 hol
So no, l wait the foer' 1t was just as it
is in real war any where outside of the
prize ring. You see your enemy and YOU
quietly make for him to do him bodily
injury or else you run away.
But there was no running away of
these doughty warriors. AS the Greclan
army came on the Trojans, one by one,
knocked Off work and went TO fighting
The Trojans had a formidable host 70
meet, but they rocked not of that, and
they mustered their soldiers in masses
from their black caverns and came on in
innumerable and very struggling compa-
MES. The combat deepened. There were
now possibly 200 or 5000 combatants ac-
tually engaged and all in a space that you
could have covered with a pocket hand
kerchef. There was fighting in the hol-
lows, there was fighting on the hills there
was nghting IN the trees, for so the dry
grass was 10 these pygmies, and over IL
all a non-cOmbatant giant, who could have
slain hundred with his heel at one crunch
had he listed, loomed with large interest
Even under the magnifying glass no
difference between an invader and a
citizen of the invaded town could be dis
CtINeu. some OF eltucr army were larger
than others, but all were of the same gem
eral shape and coloring. How in the
scattering skirmish line a single ant could
know another ant for a mortal foe il is
most difficult to imagine, but there are
more things in heaven and earth than are
dreamed of in our philosophy Possibly
the means Of recognition all lay in those
delicate and extremely sensitive twirlers
at the forehead, or perhaps the eyes,
which were to be seen only through the
glass, were gifted with keener vision than
that Of human kind. Even Thoreau, who
knew so much about ants and their bat
ties, never could decide this point.
But now the great war has been carried
well within the outer walls of the city.
The Trojans are growing less calm. Those
not yet I'm the fight are coming on vail
antly, and the Greeks, mettlesome and
hardy though they be, are finding foemen
worthy of their pincers. Here small
ant. set upon greater one, IS aided 10y
a fellOw-combatant, and the aggressor Is
fairly torn in two between them. His
head lies upon the field and the small
warrior walks back toward the city with
his body. Evidently a Hellenic warrior
has come TO grief. But now is he aveng-
ed, for a soldier of about the same size
az his carrier-om comes suddenly from
behind "A grass root and pounces upon the
Trojan and takes q death grip upon him.
ana over the hairlike neck. This struggle
Is short one
In the middle of the cowpath the steady
stream of marching Greeks pours ON 10 the
front In gueriila-like disorder The front
Itself Is most ha2y of delineatlon Some
Of H. where four or Ave sets Of duelists
are enjoying royal fights at the very doors
Of the Trojans houses, is pushed away
from the central fight by the mere act on
the part Of some of the combatants OF
dragging the ants who have engaged them
up 90 the slope or the path, and some
times right into the cayerns, whore there
remains little doubt as TO the fate Of
the dragged, though the dragger himself
may have lost his esteemed head before
De Is through with Il.
AZ times a warrior who was being lifted
bodily and hustled off toward hole would
get "a good hold upon blade OF grass or
"a twig and do some lifting himself. Then
the one who had been doing the hustlins
would find himself hustled In turn and
borne back from the Trojan citadel.
but these were mere external combats
apart from the main engagement Ia the
cowpnth and along its borders. There. In
the deepest OF 10 was mass on mass Of
pncor-wiedcrs, ana the tug of
war Wagod houy, with all the
fierce brutality of "a war OF