CHAPTER XIV
THE IPI, OR GIANT ANT-EATER
Darkness had come over the land. An ipi was listening inside of the opening of his burrow. After making sure that there was no danger, he came outside and stood still, waiting for his mate to come out also. His body was about five feet long, and covered on the upper surface and on the sides chiefly with large, thick, horny, yellowish, overlapping scales, these scales becoming smaller as they approached his head. He shook his body and the scales rattled, as they struck together.
[Illustration: [Ant-eater]]
Soon after, his mate came out, and they looked at each other and admired their wonderful coats.
The big ipi said to his mate: “Fortunate are we to possess such a good coat to cover our bodies. Our scales are so hard that after we have rolled ourselves up for protection, the teeth of our enemies cannot pierce them. They slip over them. It is our weapon of defence, as we ipis have no teeth.
“Strangely do we pass our lives. We have no choice of food, but feed on ants. We are gifted with an extensile tongue which we can shorten or lengthen at our will, and at its extremity it is covered with a glutinous secretion, and no ant when caught can ever escape. Oh, what a multitude of ants we have eaten since we were born!” he laughingly added. “What a number we need to satisfy our appetites!”
“Yes, indeed,” his mate replied, “and sometimes the ants become scarce, or we cannot find many, and we have to go back to our burrows with empty stomachs.”
Their conversation was suddenly interrupted. They heard a great noise near, and they rolled themselves up and pressed their scales against one another.
The noise had been made by a number of kambis who were fleeing at great speed from some enemy. When this noise had died away, the two ipis unrolled themselves, and said good-by to each other, and each went a different way in search of ants.
The sight of the ipis at night is wonderful. Nothing escapes them when they go through the forest and jungle. They can even spy a single ant marching alone, though it is pitch dark.
The two ipis were fortunate that night, for both discovered long lines of ants that were foraging. After getting within a proper distance from the ants, each ipi began his meal. Every time the tongue came out, its extremity struck an ant which stuck fast to the gluey matter, and could not escape. The tongue went in, deposited the ant inside in the twinkling of an eye, and then came out again and struck another ant.
After eating thousands of ants, the appetite of each was satisfied, and they returned toward their homes and told each other of the good luck they had had, and soon were fast asleep.
In the course of time the ipis had to travel farther and farther to get their meal of ants, and one evening, after their return with empty stomachs, the large ipi said to his mate, “Let us leave this part of the forest and go somewhere else, for ants have certainly become very scarce in this neighborhood.”
The following night they bade good-by to their old burrow, where they had had so many days of cosey sleep, and where they had raised a family. They journeyed toward a new country, picking up here and there an ant with their sticky tongues. Ere long they came to a big tree, and saw a hollow under its roots, and said, “Here is a good dark place to spend the day and sleep,” and they went in and slept soundly. When night came, they set forth again, and continued to seek for a region where ants were plentiful.
The third night they met a great many ants that were foraging. They thought it would be a good country for them to settle in, and said, “Let us find a hill on the side of which we may make our burrow.” They were soon fortunate enough to find one, and set to work with a will digging out the ground with their claws. That night they did not finish their burrow, so they went back to the hole under the root of the tree where they had slept before. The following night they worked very hard and finished their home, which had two openings communicating with the chamber in which they were to sleep.
When the work was done, one ipi said to the other: “We have worked hard to make our new home. It is a good thing for us that our short legs are so muscular and that our claws are so strong. How much earth we can move away!”
They felt very happy to be able to sleep in their new home. There they lived for a while, ants being plentiful in the neighborhood, and raised a family of little ipis.