t--fought for his life,
crushing to death scores of the enemy before giving up.

They were a merciless army and their number was countless, with host
upon host following close on each other's heels. A horde of warriors
found a bird in my game-bag, and left of it hardly a feather. I
wondered whether they would discover me, and they did, though I think
it was more by accident than by intention. Nevertheless a half-dozen
ants appeared on the foot-strands, nervously twiddling their antennae
in my direction. Their appraisal was brief; with no more than a
second's delay they started toward me. I waited until they were well
on their way, then vigorously twanged the cords under them harpwise,
sending all the scouts into mid-air and headlong down among their
fellows. So far as I know, this was a revolutionary maneuver in
military tactics, comparable only to the explosion of a set mine. But
even so, when the last of this brigade had gone on their menacing,
pitiless way, and the danger had passed to a new province, I could not
help thinking of the certain, inexorable fate of a man who, unable to
move from his hammock or to make any defense, should be thus exposed
to their attack. There could be no help for him if but one of this
great host should scent him out and carry the word back to the rank
and file.

It was after this army had been lost in the black shadows of the
forest floor, that I remembered those others who had come with
them--those attendant birds of prey who profit by the evil work of
this legion. For, hovering over them, sometimes a little in advance,
there had been a flying squadron of antbirds and others which had come
to feed, not on the ants, but on the insects which had been
frightened into flight. At one time, three of these dropped down to
perch on my hammock, nervous, watchful, and alert, waiting but a
moment before darting after some ill-fated moth or grasshopper which,
in its great panic, had escaped one danger only to fall an easy victim
to another. For a little while, the twittering and chirping of these
camp-followers, these feathered profiteers, was brought back to me on
the wind; and when it had died away, I took up my work again in a
glade in which no voice of insect reached my ears. The hunting ants
had done their work thoroughly.

And so it comes about that by day or by night the hammock carries with
it its own reward to those who have learned but one thing--that there
is a chasm between pancake