ANT RAIDERS.

Hawera Star, Volume XLVIII, 6 December 1924, Page 16

ANT RAIDERS.

STRANGE HAPPENINGS

IN WEST AFRICA

A strange scene was witnessed at Korowe (Tahgayika Territory) " reports a Daily Chronicle correspondent. Two white men in their natal suits leaped, yelled, and gesticulated by the light of the midnight moon on the veldt in front of our bungalow. Each held a tin of kerosene, and every now and then would halt, mutter strange oaths, pluck agitatedly at himself, 1 and scatter the oil in a circle about him. Beyond, in the compound, Omari, the cook, and Pingo, the kitchen boy, were leaping as well, and Ghui, the 'piebald pup, was careering" arounds in circles, snapping at his tail.

We had been raided by siafu! They had stormed the bungalow with an army several millions strong, and by the time Omari's agonised yell “Waßahi! Siafu! (O Allah, the red ants I)’’ had awakened iis, the floors the walla and the beds and clothing, were a-writhe w,ith, the - pertinacious, - biting horrors. When red ants raid a house, the occupant, if he is wise, gets out and stands, himself in a pool of oil,. for nought else in the world will, stop them from eating him alive! '/ The mehwa, or white-ant, is bad enough, for in course of time he will eat away the foundations of your, dwelling and bring the whole, lot down about your ears. The seezi-meezi, fruit-ant, is an intolerable nuisance, when thousands of his microscopic tribe smother in squirming black every article of food, and that amber-coloured .pest, the maji-ya-moto, or hot-water ant who codes his tail over his back and squirts formic acid into your eyes as you pass beneath the mango trees is -a trial You may meet the battalions of the Askari ant. which march about the bush paths in regular formation like a human army, but he does let you know where he is, for he hisses like steaih when he gets annoyed, and then you can kill the msimamisi. or leader of the trek so that all the others go back the £ way they came. The tree-ant, too, will drop in hundreds into your hair and * bite like fury. But all these one can deal with—not so the siafu.- •,

His bite is like the sting of a hornet, and he digs in. his pincers and grips like a bulldog ; you can pull him in two, but lie will not let gb. The natives know this, and use him to bind together the &ide& of a wound. When he raids he drives all him: elephant and lion fl.ee when siafu trek in the forest, and '-ometimes natives caught sleeping in the bush, have been surrounded and killed bv the siefn. annies. Siafu raid in millions; one column er/vering ti the rate of thousands ef ants a, m.inufe. will t.°ke a week heits veo.’-rriyn ; r.'V onto And tliev imr>l<"'~ n b 1 e: j>k yon mu do is + o flee from their nn+h. T'boir numbers and feroeit.v inspire the terror of utter helplecouoss.