Col. St. Clair, after a visit by a species of small Red-ants, makes mention of the following instance, among others, of their singular destructiveness: “I next discovered that a little pet deer, which I had purchased from a negro, was extremely ill. I could not discover the cause of its malady, until, placing it on its legs, I observed that it would not let one foot touch the ground, and, on examining it, I found, to my grief, that the Red-ants had absolutely eaten a hole into the bone. The poor little animal pined all that day and died in the evening.”[533] Capt. Stedman relates that the Fire-ants of Surinam caused a whole company of soldiers to start and jump about as if scalded with boiling water; and its nests were so numerous that it was not easy to avoid them.[534] And Knox, in his account of Ceylon, mentions a black Ant, called by the natives _Coddia_ or _Kaddiya_,[535] which, he says, “bites desperately, as bad as if a man were burnt by a coal of fire; but they are of a noble nature, and will not begin unless you disturb them.” The reason the Singhalese assign for the horrible pain occasioned by their bite is curious, and is thus related by Knox: “Formerly these Ants went to ask a wife of the _Noya_, a venomous and noble kind of snake;[536] and because they had such a high spirit to dare to offer to be related to such a generous creature, they had this virtue bestowed upon them, that they should sting after this manner. And if they had obtained a wife of the Noya, they should have had the privilege to sting full as bad as he.”[537] Capt. Stedman has a story of a large Ant that stripped the trees of their leaves, to feed, as was supposed by the natives of Surinam, a blind serpent under ground,[538] which is somewhat akin to this: as is also another, related to Kirby and Spence by a friend, of a species of Mantis, taken in one of the Indian islands, which, according to the received opinion among the natives, was the parent of all their serpents.[539] But, the reverse: Among the harmless snakes of Mexico is a beautiful one about a foot in length, and of the thickness of the little finger, which appears to take pleasure in the society of Ants, insomuch that it will accompany these insects upon their expeditions, and return with them to their usual nest. From this peculiarity it is called by the Spaniards and Mexicans the “Mother of the Ants.”[540] When in Africa, Du Chaillu was told by the natives that criminals in former times were exposed to the path of the Bashikouay-ants, as the most cruel way of putting them to death.[541] This dreadful manner of torturing was at one time also practiced by the Singhalese, and I have heard that several British soldiers have thus met their fate. The Termites have been referred to before as having been employed for a similar purpose.