wonderful that, after a time, the primitive individualistic tendency should again assert itself. But when the fugitive is overtaken, it assists the other to roll the ball back, and the end of it all is a meal shared peacefully between the two, in one common apartment. If we suppose that the instinct, or capacity, of working together for some common end has had any beginning, surely we might expect to find it in some such state of affairs as this. The result of primitive conceptions is that two Scarabæi are often obliged to roll one ball between them, and if there be any advantage in this arrangement, natural selection will no doubt do the rest. That it has already begun to do it is, I think, very probable; but Fabre was not an evolutionist. ----- Footnote 70: The Malay Archipelago. Footnote 71: Darwin, The Descent of Man, p. 300. Footnote 72: The Malay Archipelago. Footnote 73: Souvenirs Entomologiques. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ CHAPTER XVII Do ants sow and reap?—Rival observers—The Texan _v._ Macaulay’s schoolboy—More evidence wanted—How ants cross rivers—Tubular bridges—Ant armies—A world in flight—Living nests—Ants and plants—Mutual dependence—Nests in thorns and tubers—Ant honey-pots—Business humanity—Burial customs—A strange observation—Two views of ants. MUSHROOM-GROWING, especially if the ants plant the mushrooms in the way stated by Mr. Tanner, is just as extraordinary, I think, as their habit of planting a field with ant-rice and reaping it at the proper time would be, did they really practise it. Up to a little while ago it certainly seemed as though they did, for there was Dr. Lincecum’s definite statement based upon twelve years’ observation, and this, if not confirmed by Mr. McCook, was, at any rate, not contradicted by him. On the contrary, McCook mentioned a good many facts pointing in the direction of Lincecum’s assertion, and though he did not consider them decisive, he could see no reason why the ants should not act in this way, as indeed there is none: so that as he had only stayed a few months where Lincecum had lived for twelve years, he seemed like a weaker witness supporting, according to his opportunities of observation, a much stronger one. Now, however, comes another witness, whose opportunities have also been great, and in a somewhat heavy-handed way, in a spirit of myth-slaying and irrelevant reference to supposed schoolboy knowledge, hardly required in face of all that ants are known to do, denies the whole thing.