A TERRIBLE BATTLE.

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume XIV, Issue 204, 27 August 1879, Page 6

A TERRIBLE BATTLE.

[Correspondent "Be'-gravia " When I first noticed the fray it could only have just commenced for round Mount Colony, though in a fearfully excited state, the principa! portion of the black ants were still congregated. Far away at the base of the yellow out hill I noticed a few block ants phenomenally still, for on an. not inceesantly moving may be generally looked upon, so far as this life goes, ds having been disfranchised. Between tbe citadel of the yellow ants and Mount Colony a few black and yellow ants were apparently enjoying a friendly wrestling match. Aoy one watching tbe athletes, however, would have noticed that, whenever one was thrown, he, like the black ants at the bottom of yellow ants' hills made no attempt to move -gaic, and manifested that wonderful indifference to subsequent proceedings which doctors call death. Aa I watched, the angry movement round the Mound continued. From tbe mound and out of the bill in wbich the yellow ante lived, the wrestlers in the plain between the two were, 1 noticed, constantly receiviog fresh accessions of Btrength. Detachments of black ants were then formed at intervals, and met by opposing detachments of yellow ants, ordered out of their ant hills. Had a general commanded the forcep, the fighting c uld not have been more scientific. The skirmish extended into au engagement, into a heavy battle, and at last the battle into an assault on the yellow ante' hill iteelf. As I wotcbed, the supports of tbe black ants were thrown forward more rapidly, and in greater numbers. Out of the yellow ant.' hills deployed heavier columns. The charge and Bbock of the oppossing masses became more fierce, and the litter cf the dead more numerous. The tide of battle, surging dow to Mount Colony, and now to the yellow ant_' hill, look narrower Sowings to the former, atd more repeatedly neared the latter ; for the yellow ants were slowly giving way, aud their black assailants were forcing themselves nearer and nearer the ant-hill. Had it baen possible to have separated the combatants now would bave dons it. Small as tbey were, there was a sanguinary ferocity about the black ante which alienated sympathy, while the bravery of the yellow ants, coupled with tbe fact that they were nearly a third smaller then their foes, compelled something like admiration. To add to Ibe horror of the scene, the butchery was executed in the deadestsilence. The visible rush and excitement of the storming parties could be plainly seen. The heat end action of attack aud defence were as apparent as if the hill I sat watching had been one of the heights of the Scbipke, and the combatants Turks aod Russians. It was plainer, for no smoke of battle hid slayers aod slain. All was done in clear broad, genial sunshine, and was as .'plainly observable as the tortures wbich are being ioflcted on the Elumite prisoners in some of the Assyrian ta_lets in the British Museum. But aa thoße hapless wretches, pegged down to the ground, and slowly skinned alive by the implacable figures standing knife in hand over them, had been voicelessly suffering the most excruciating agony any time these thousand years, so the unfortunate yellow ants were dismembered without the faintest sign reaching, me. There may have been cries and screams, and the sobbings of unutterable physical anguish. If these were, my senses were too gross to perceive them. I could see limb torn from limb. I could watch the body of some miserable prisoner lengthening under the awful strain, as two bands of its captors tugged it in two. Tben it snapped asunder, and its bloodthirsty assailants captured another foe.