Plutarch, speaking of the Ant, says: "Aratus in his prognostics setteth this down for a rain toward, when they bring forth their seeds and grains (pupæ), and lay them abroad to take the air:
'When Ants make haste with all their eggs aload, Forth of their holes to carry them abroad.'"[521]
In the Treasvrie of Avncient and Moderne Times, it is also asserted that "when Ants walk the thickest, and more than in vsuall numbers, meeting together confusedly, it is a manifest signe of raine."[522]
It is related of the celebrated Timour, that being once forced to take shelter from his enemies in a ruined building, he sat alone many hours; and, desirous of diverting his mind from his hopeless condition, at length fixed his observation upon an Ant which was carrying a grain of corn (probably a pupa) larger than itself, up a high wall. Numbering the efforts it made to accomplish this object, he found that the grain fell sixty-nine times to the ground; but the seventieth time it reached the top of the wall. "This sight," said Timour, "gave me courage at the moment, and I have never forgotten the lesson it conveyed."[523]
Plutarch, in his comparison between land and water creatures, narrates the following anecdote: "Gleanthus the Philosopher, although he maintaineth not that beasts have any use of reason, made report nevertheless that he was present at the sight of such a spectacle and occurrent as this. There were (quoth he) a number of Ants which went toward another Ant's hole, that was not their own, carrying with them the corpse of a dead Ant; out of which hole, there came certain other Ants to meet them on the way (as it were) to parl with them, and within a while returned back and went down again; after this they came forth a second, yea a third time, and retired accordingly until in the end they brought up from beneath (as it were a ransom for the dead body) a grub or little worm; which the others received and took upon their shoulders, and after they had delivered in exchange the aforesaid corpse, departed home."[524]
Of the ingenuity of the Ant in removing obstacles, the following anecdote is a very appropriate illustration: A gentleman of Cambridge one day observed an Ant dragging along what, with respect to the creature's size, might be denominated a log of wood. Others were severally employed, each in its own way. Presently the Ant in question came to an ascent, where the weight of the wood seemed for a while to overpower him: he did not remain long perplexed with it; for three or four others, observing his dilemma, came behind and pushed it up. As soon, however, as he got it on level ground, they left it to his care, and went to their own work. The piece he was drawing happened to be considerably thicker at one end than the other. This soon threw the poor fellow into a fresh difficulty; he unluckily dragged it between two bits of wood. After several fruitless efforts, finding it would not go through, he adopted the only mode that even a man in similar circumstances would have taken: he came behind it, pulled it back again, and turned it on its edge; when, running again to the other end, it passed through without the slightest difficulty.[525]