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Show 265, in this direction. The smallest of creatures was the fiercest hunter. Ants, whose bodies were mostly jaws, who attacked without visible cause; they were ubiquitous and inexplicable. I can't understand the need of their ferocious courage; there seems to be no common sense in it. Sometimes, no doubt, they fight in defense of their homes, but they fight anywhere and always wherever they can find anything to bite. As soon as a vulnerable spot is discovered on man or beast, they stand on their heads and sink their jaws, and though torn limb from limb, so they will yet hold on and die biting deeper. When I contemplate this fierce creature so widely distributed and strongly intrenched, I see that much remains to be done ere the world is brought under the rule of universal peace and love. So Muir was awakened to reality by the bite of an ant. "A quick electric flame of pain flashes along the outraged nerves." Muir's oceanic mood was shattered. It is reasonable to see a sense of humor here, also a fine sense of irony. One was never so likely to be bit as when lying in the June sun of the Sierra, dreaming. But there was also a real sense of disenchantment. In a more serious mood, he reconsidered that bears and Indians ate the "tickly acid body" of ants "with keen relish. Thus are the poor biters bitten, like every other biter, °ig or little, in the world's great family-" He was satisfied with this theory of dialectical retribution as he deliberately and abruptly changed the theme of his thinking. He considered |