Till they came to this cliff the two ants moved parallel, but here one of them went first, and climbed up the bank with its end of the stick, after which the second followed and brought up the other. An inch or two farther, on the level ground, the second ant left hold and went away, and the first laboured on with the twig and dragged it unaided across the rest of the path. Though many other ants stayed and looked at the twig a moment, none of them now offered assistance, as if the chief obstacle had been surmounted. Several other ants passed, each carrying the slender needles which fall from firs, and which seemed nothing in their powerful grasp. These burdens of wood all went in one direction, to the right of the path. I took a step there, but stayed to watch two more ants, who had got a long scarlet fly between them, one holding it by the head and the other by the tail. They were hurrying their prey over the dead leaves and decayed sticks which strewed the ground, and dragging it mercilessly through moss and grass. I put the tip of my stick on the victim, but instead of abandoning it they tugged and pulled desperately, as if they would have torn it to pieces rather than have yielded. So soon as I released it away they went through the fragments of branches, rushing the quicker for the delay. A little farther there was a spot where the ground for a yard or two was covered with small dead brown leaves, last year's, apparently of birch, for some young birch saplings grew close by. One of these leaves suddenly rose up and began to move of itself, as it seemed; an ant had seized it, and holding it by the edge travelled on, so that as the insect was partly hidden under it, the leaf appeared to move alone, now over sticks and now under them. It reminded me of the sight which seemed so wonderful to the early navigators when they came to a country where, as they first thought, the leaves were alive and walked about. The ant with the leaf went towards a large heap of rubbish under the sapling birches. While watching the innumerable multitude of these insects, whose road here crossed these dead dry leaves, I became conscious of a rustling sound, which at first I attributed to the wind, but seeing that the fern was still, and that the green leaves of a Spanish chestnut opposite did not move, I began to realise that this creeping, rustling noise, distinctly audible, was not caused by any wind, but by the thousands upon thousands of insects passing over the dead leaves and among the grass. Stooping down to listen better, there could be no doubt of it: it was the tramp of this immense army.