THE ANTS’ MONDAY DINNER

How did I know what the ants had for dinner last Monday? It is odd that I should have known, but I’ll tell you how it happened.

I was sitting under a big pine tree, high up on a hillside. The hillside was more than seven thousand feet above the sea, and that is higher than many mountains which people travel hundreds of miles to look at. But this hillside was in Colorado, so there was nothing wonderful in being up so high.

I had been watching the great mountains with snow on them, and the great forests of pine trees—miles and miles of them—so close together that it looks as if you could lie down on their tops and not fall through; and my eyes were tired with looking at such great, grand things, so many miles off.

So I looked down on the ground where I was sitting, and watched the ants which were running about everywhere, as busy and restless as if they had the whole world on their shoulders.

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Suddenly I saw a tiny caterpillar¹, which seemed to be bounding along in a very strange way. In a second more I saw an ant seize hold of him and begin to drag him off.

The caterpillar was three times as long as the ant, and his body was more than twice as large round as the biggest part of the ant’s body.

“Ho! ho! Mr. Ant,” said I, “you needn’t think you’re going to be strong enough to drag that fellow very far.”

Why, it was about the same thing as if you or I should drag off a calf², which was kicking and struggling all the time; only that the calf hasn’t half so many legs to catch hold of things with as the caterpillar had.

Poor caterpillar! how he did try to get away! But the ant never gave him a second’s time to take a good grip of anything; and he was cunning enough, too, to drag him on his side, so that he couldn’t use his legs very well.

Up and down, and under and over stones and sticks;decoration133decoration in and out of tufts of grass; up to the very top of the tallest blades, and then down again; over gravel³ and sand, and across bridges of pine needles from stone to stone; backward all the way ran that ant, dragging the caterpillar after him.

I watched him very closely, thinking, of course, he must be going toward his house. Presently he darted⁴ up the trunk of a pine tree.

“Dear me!” said I, “ants don’t live in trees! What does this mean?”

The bark of the tree was all broken and jagged, and full of seams twenty times as deep as the height of the ant’s body. But he didn’t mind; down one side and up the other he went.

They must have been awful chasms⁵ to him, and yet he never once stopped or went a bit slower. I had to watch the ant very closely, not to lose sight of him altogether.

I began to think that he was merely trying to kill the caterpillar; that, perhaps, he didn’t mean to eat him, after all. How did I know but some ants mightdecoration134decoration hunt caterpillars⁶, just as some men hunt deer, for fun, and not at all because they need food?

If I had been sure of this, I would have spoiled Mr. Ant’s sport for him very soon, you may be sure, and set the poor caterpillar free. But I never heard of an ant’s being cruel; and if it were really for dinner for his family that he was working so hard, I thought he ought to be helped, and not hindered.
hawk⁷ and two birds

Just then I heard a sharp cry overhead. I looked up, and there was an enormous hawk, sailing round indecoration135decoration circles, with two small birds flying after him. They were pouncing⁸ down on his head, and then darting⁹ away, and all the time making shrill¹⁰ cries of fright and hatred¹¹.

I knew very well what that meant. Mr. Hawk was also out trying to do some marketing¹² for his dinner. He had his eye on some little birds in their nest, and there were the father and mother birds driving him away.

You wouldn’t have believed that two such little birds could drive off such a big creature as the hawk, but they did. They seemed to fairly buzz round his head just as flies buzz round a horse’s head.

At last he gave up the quest and flew off so far that he vanished in the blue sky, and the little birds came skimming home again into the forest.

“Well, well,” said I, “the little people are stronger than the big ones, after all! Where has my ant gone?”

Sure enough! It hadn’t been two minutes that I had been watching the hawk and the birds, but in thatdecoration136decoration two minutes the ant and the caterpillar had disappeared. At last I found them,—where do you think? In a fold of my coat, on which I was sitting!

The ant was running round and round the caterpillar. I shook the fold out, and as soon as the cloth lay straight and smooth, the ant fastened his nippers into his prey¹³ and started off as fast as ever.

I suppose if I could have seen his face, and had understood the language of ants’ features, I should have seen plainly written there, “Dear me, what sort of a country was that I tumbled into?”

By this time the caterpillar had had the breath pretty well knocked out of his body, and was so limp and helpless that the ant was not afraid of his getting away from him. So he stopped now and then to rest.

Sometimes he would spring on the caterpillar’s back, and stretch himself out there; sometimes he would stand still on one side and look at him sharply, keeping one nipper on his head.

All the time he was working steadily¹⁴ in one direction; he was headed for home I felt certain.

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It astonished me very much, at first, that none of the ants he met took any notice of him; they all went on their own way, and never took so much as a sniff¹⁵ at the caterpillar.

But pretty soon I said to myself, “You stupid woman, not to suppose that ants can be as well behaved as people! When you passed Mr. Jones yesterday, you didn’t peep into his market-basket, nor touch the cabbage he had under his arm.”

Presently the ant dropped the caterpillar, and ran on a few steps—I mean inches—to meet another ant who was coming towards him. They put their heads close together for a second.

I could not hear what they said, but I could easily imagine, for they both ran quickly back to the caterpillar, and one took him by the head and the other by the tail, and then they lugged¹⁶ him along finely. It was only a few steps, however, to the ant’s house; that was the reason he happened to meet this friend just coming out.

The door was a round hole in the ground, about asdecoration138decoration big as my little finger. Several ants were standing¹⁷ in the doorway¹⁸, watching these two come up with the caterpillar. They all took hold as soon as the caterpillar was on the doorstep, and almost before I knew he was there, they had tumbled him down, heels over head, into the ground, and that was the last I saw of him.

The oddest thing was, how the ants came running home from all directions. I don’t believe there was any dinner bell rung, though there might have been one too fine for my ears to hear; but in a minute, I counted thirty-three ants running down that hole. I fancied they looked as hungry as wolves.

I had a great mind to dig down into the hole with a stick, and see what had become of the caterpillar. But I thought it wasn’t quite fair to take the roof off a man’s house to find out how he cooks his beef for dinner; so I sat still and wondered whether they would eat him all up or whether they would leave any for Tuesday; then I went home to my own dinner.

—Helen Hunt Jackson.

1 caterpillar   

n.毛虫，蝴蝶的幼虫

参考例句：

• A butterfly is produced by metamorphosis from a caterpillar.蝴蝶是由毛虫脱胎变成的。
• A caterpillar must pass through the cocoon stage to become a butterfly.毛毛虫必须经过茧的阶段才能变成蝴蝶。

2 calf   

n.小牛，犊，幼仔，小牛皮

参考例句：

• The cow slinked its calf.那头母牛早产了一头小牛犊。
• The calf blared for its mother.牛犊哞哞地高声叫喊找妈妈。

3 gravel   

n.砂跞；砂砾层；结石

参考例句：

• We bought six bags of gravel for the garden path.我们购买了六袋碎石用来铺花园的小路。
• More gravel is needed to fill the hollow in the drive.需要更多的砾石来填平车道上的坑洼。

4 darted   

v.投掷，投射( dart的过去式和过去分词 )；向前冲，飞奔

参考例句：

• The lizard darted out its tongue at the insect. 蜥蜴伸出舌头去吃小昆虫。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• The old man was displeased and darted an angry look at me. 老人不高兴了，瞪了我一眼。 来自《简明英汉词典》

5 chasms   

裂缝( chasm的名词复数 )； 裂口； 分歧； 差别

参考例句：

• She found great chasms in her mathematics and physics. 她觉得她的数学课和物理课的知识还很欠缺。
• The sectarian chasms remain deep, the wounds of strife raw. 各派别的分歧巨大，旧恨新仇交织。

6 caterpillars   

n.毛虫( caterpillar的名词复数 )；履带

参考例句：

• Caterpillars eat the young leaves of this plant. 毛毛虫吃这种植物的嫩叶。
• Caterpillars change into butterflies or moths. 毛虫能变成蝴蝶或蛾子。 来自辞典例句

7 hawk   

n.鹰，骗子；鹰派成员

参考例句：

• The hawk swooped down on the rabbit and killed it.鹰猛地朝兔子扑下来,并把它杀死。
• The hawk snatched the chicken and flew away.老鹰叼了小鸡就飞走了。

8 pouncing   

v.突然袭击( pounce的现在分词 )；猛扑；一眼看出；抓住机会（进行抨击）

参考例句：

• Detective Sun grinned and, pouncing on the gourd, smashed it against the wall. 孙侦探笑了，一把将瓦罐接过来，往墙上一碰。 来自汉英文学 - 骆驼祥子
• We saw the tiger pouncing on the goat. 我们看见老虎向那只山羊扑过去。 来自互联网

9 darting   

v.投掷，投射( dart的现在分词 )；向前冲，飞奔

参考例句：

• Swallows were darting through the clouds. 燕子穿云急飞。 来自《现代英汉综合大词典》
• Swallows were darting through the air. 燕子在空中掠过。 来自辞典例句

10 shrill   

adj.尖声的；刺耳的；v尖叫

参考例句：

• Whistles began to shrill outside the barn.哨声开始在谷仓外面尖叫。
• The shrill ringing of a bell broke up the card game on the cutter.刺耳的铃声打散了小汽艇的牌局。

11 hatred   

n.憎恶，憎恨，仇恨

参考例句：

• He looked at me with hatred in his eyes.他以憎恨的眼光望着我。
• The old man was seized with burning hatred for the fascists.老人对法西斯主义者充满了仇恨。

12 marketing   

n.行销，在市场的买卖，买东西

参考例句：

• They are developing marketing network.他们正在发展销售网络。
• He often goes marketing.他经常去市场做生意。

13 prey   

n.被掠食者，牺牲者，掠食；v.捕食，掠夺，折磨

参考例句：

• Stronger animals prey on weaker ones.弱肉强食。
• The lion was hunting for its prey.狮子在寻找猎物。

14 steadily   

adv.稳定地；不变地；持续地

参考例句：

• The scope of man's use of natural resources will steadily grow.人类利用自然资源的广度将日益扩大。
• Our educational reform was steadily led onto the correct path.我们的教学改革慢慢上轨道了。

15 sniff   

vi.嗅…味道；抽鼻涕；对嗤之以鼻，蔑视

参考例句：

• The police used dogs to sniff out the criminals in their hiding - place.警察使用警犬查出了罪犯的藏身地点。
• When Munchie meets a dog on the beach, they sniff each other for a while.当麦奇在海滩上碰到另一条狗的时候，他们会彼此嗅一会儿。

16 lugged   

vt.用力拖拉（lug的过去式与过去分词形式）

参考例句：

• She lugged the heavy case up the stairs. 她把那只沉甸甸的箱子拖上了楼梯。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• They used to yell that at football when you lugged the ball. 踢足球的时候，逢着你抢到球，人们总是对你这样嚷嚷。 来自辞典例句

17 standing   

n.持续，地位；adj.永久的，不动的，直立的，不流动的

参考例句：

• After the earthquake only a few houses were left standing.地震过后只有几幢房屋还立着。
• They're standing out against any change in the law.他们坚决反对对法律做任何修改。

18 doorway   

n.门口，(喻)入门；门路，途径

参考例句：

• They huddled in the shop doorway to shelter from the rain.他们挤在商店门口躲雨。
• Mary suddenly appeared in the doorway.玛丽突然出现在门口。