There are ants too, large and small, black, white and red, and their name is legion. Sideboards, tables or anything else in Siam upon which food is placed must stand in bowls of water or oil, and it will not do to forget this even for a few moments. One morning, on my way to the dining-room, I stopped and admired my canary bird that was hanging on my front veranda. Going out again after breakfast, I saw a procession of beautiful yellow feathers moving along on a beam over head, and on hastening to the cage I found my pet lying dead, stung to death by the red ants and nearly stripped of its plumage. One of our missionary families once went to spend a few weeks at another mission-station, and on their return they found the white ants had come up through the floor and had eaten their way through a trunk to the top, and every fold of the garments needed mending. We never wearied watching the fireflies as in countless multitudes they would spread themselves over the branches of their favorite trees, and alternately, with the utmost regularity and exactness, all at once give out their diamond spark or hide their light in darkness. We were often serenaded at evening as we sat on our veranda by grasshoppers and crickets, while immense frogs would sing the bass in the grand chorus. Beautiful, harmless little lizards, about a finger long, ready for their evening meal of mosquitoes and other insects, make their appearance on our walls and ceilings as soon as the lamps are lighted. I have often counted between twenty and thirty of them out at once. There is another lizard, almost as large as a young kitten, which also comes out on our walls for his evening meal, having hid through the day behind our mirrors or pictures. It is quite harmless, but with its loud outcry of _tookaah! tookaah!_ it often startles new-comers from their midnight slumbers. There are crocodiles in great numbers in the rivers and creeks of Siam. In one day’s boatride on the Upper Menam, Dr. House once counted one hundred and seventy, varying in size from three to fifteen feet. Let me tell one or two true stories of crocodiles. When we were once visiting the mission-station at Petchaburee a crocodile seized a young girl twelve years old and devoured her, leaving only an arm in the boat. The governor, wishing to destroy the monster, ordered a search to be made for it, and invited us to see the captures which his men made and brought to our landing. Three huge fellows, averaging twelve feet each, lay securely pinioned on the bottom of their boat, but neither of them proved to be the one sought for. [Illustration: HUNTING THE CROCODILE.]