There is an old Eastern proverb, that "what the Ant collects in a year the monks eat up in a night," which seems to be founded on the supposition that the Ants provide themselves with stores of food. Juvenal, also, observes, in his Sixth Satire, that "after the example of the Ant, some have learned to provide against cold and hunger."
"Since, therefore," says Moufet, "(to wind up all in a few words) they (the Ants) are so exemplary for their great piety, prudence, justice, valor, temperance, modesty, charity, friendship, frugality, perseverance, industry and art; it is no wonder that Plato, in Phaedone, hath determined, that they who without the help of philosophy have lead a civil life by custom or from their own diligence, they had their souls from Ants, and when they die they are turned to Ants again. To this may be added the fable of the Myrmidons, who being a people of Aegina, applied themselves to diligent labor in tilling the ground, continual digging, hard toiling, and constant sparing, joined with virtue, and they grew thereby so rich, that they passed the common condition and ingenuity of men, and Theognis knew not how to compare them better than to Pismires, that they were originally descended from them, or were transformed into them, and as Strabo reports they were therefore called Myrmidons. The Greeks relate the history otherwise than other men do; namely, that Jupiter was changed into a Pismire, and so deflowered Eurymedusa, the mother of the Graces, as if he could no otherwise deceive the best woman, then in the shape of the best creature. Hence ever after was he called Pismire Jupiter, or, Jupiter, King of Pismires.
"They do better, in my opinion, who observe the Pismire, and grow rich by following his manners in labor, industry, rest, and study. We read of Midas that he was the richest King of all the West, and when he was a boy, the Pismires carried grains of wheat into his mouth while he slept, and so foreshowed without doubt that he should be endowed with the Pismire's prudence, and should by his labor and frugality, gain so much riches, that he should be called the Golden boy of fortune, and the Darling of prosperity. Aelian. And when the Ants did devour and eat up the live serpent of Tiberius Caesar, which he so dearly loved, did they not thereby give him sufficient warning that he should take heed to himself for fear of the multitude, by whom he was afterwards cruelly murdered? Suetonius."
Of the wars and battles of the Ants, now so familiar from the writings of Huber and others, one of the oldest records is that given by Aeneas Sylvius, who afterward became Pope Pius II., of an engagement contested with obstinacy by a great and a small species, on the trunk of a pear-tree. "This action," he states, "was fought in the pontificate of Eugenius the Fourth, in the presence of Nicholas Pistoriensis, an eminent lawyer, who related the whole history of the battle with the greatest fidelity." Another engagement of the same description is recorded by Olaus Magnus, as having happened previous to the expulsion of Christiern the Second, of Sweden, and the smallest species, having been victorious, are said to have buried the bodies of their own soldiers that had been killed, while they left those of their adversaries a prey to the birds.
Alexander Ross, in his Appendix to the Arcana Microcosmi, p. 219, tells us: "That the cruel battles between the Venetians and Insubrians, and that also between the Liegeois and the Burgundians, in which about thirty thousand men were slain, were presignified by a great combat between two swarms of Emmets (Ants)."
Ants were used in divination by the Greeks, and generally foretold good. They were also considered an attribute of Ceres.
The following extract is from an English North-Country chap-book, entitled the Royal Dream Book: "To dream of Ants or Bees denotes that you will live in a great town or city, or in a large family, and that you will be industrious, happy, well married, and have a large family." The Ant and the Bee are common figures to express these predictions.
I heard a mother once say to her child, "Never destroy Ants, for they are fairies, and will so bewitch our cows that they will give no milk." This superstition prevails in particular about Washington and in Virginia.
Mrs. Meer Hassan Ali, in an interesting article on the Ants of India, remarks that she has often witnessed the Hindoos, male and female, depositing small portions of sugar near Ants' nests as acts of charity to commence the day with. With the natives of India, this lady also tells us, it is a common opinion that wherever the Red-ants colonize, prosperity attends the owner of that house.
We read in Purchas's Pilgrims, that "the natives of Carabaia and Malabar will go out of the path if they light on an Ant-hill, lest they might happily tread on some of them."
Other insects are looked upon by these people with the same respect.
Moufet says: "In Isthmus the priests sacrificed Pismires to the sun, either because they thought the sun the most beautiful, and therefore they would offer unto him the most beautiful creature, or the most wise, as seeing all things, and therefore they offered unto him the wisest creature."
In the twenty-seventh chapter of the Koran, which was revealed at Mecca, and entitled the Ant, we find, among other strange things, an odd story of the Ant, which has therefore given name to the chapter. It is as follows: "And his armies were gathered together unto Solomon, consisting of genii, and men, and birds; and they were led in distant bands, until they came to the valley of Ants. And an Ant, seeing the hosts approaching, said, Ants, enter ye into your habitations, lest Solomon and his army tread you under foot, and perceive it not. And Solomon smiled, laughing at her words, and said, Lord, excite me that I may be thankful for thy favor, wherewith thou hast favored me, and my parents; and that I may do that which is right, and well pleasing unto thee: and introduce me, through thy mercy, into paradise, among my servants, the righteous."
Thevenot mentions "Solomon's Ant" among the "Beasts that shall enter into Paradise" in the belief of the Turks, and gives the following reason: "Solomon was the greatest king that ever was, for all creatures obeyed him, and brought him presents, amongst others, an Ant brought him a Locust, which it had dragged along by main force: Solomon, perceiving that the Ant had brought a thing bigger than itself, accepted the present, and preferred it before all other creatures."
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 (pupae), 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.'"
In the Treasury of Ancient and Modern Times, it is also asserted that "when Ants walk the thickest, and more than in usual numbers, meeting together confusedly, it is a manifest sign of rain."
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."
Plutarch, in his comparison between land and water creatures, narrates the following anecdote: "Cleanthes 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 parley 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."
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.
Franklin was much inclined to believe Ants could communicate their thoughts or desires to one another, and confirmed his opinion by several experiments. Observing that when an Ant finds some sugar, it runs immediately under ground to its hole, where, having stayed a little while, a whole army comes out, unites and marches to the place where the sugar is, and carry it off by pieces; and that if an Ant meets with a dead fly, which it cannot carry alone, it immediately hastens home, and soon after some more come out, creep to the fly, and carry it away; observing this, he put a little earthen pot, containing some treacle, into a closet, into which a number of Ants collected, and devoured the treacle very quickly. He then shook them out, and tied the pot with a thin string to a nail which he had fastened in the ceiling, so that it hung down by the string. A single Ant by chance remained in the pot, and when it had gorged itself upon the treacle, and wanted to get off, it was under great concern to find a way, and kept running about the bottom of the pot, but in vain. At last it found, after many attempts, the way to the ceiling, by going along the string. After it was come there, it ran to the wall, and thence to the ground. It had scarcely been away half an hour, when a great swarm of Ants came out, got up to the ceiling, and crept along the string into the pot, and began to eat again. This they continued till the treacle was all eaten; in the mean time one swarm running down the string, and the other up.