FRATERNAL CONFEDERACIES AMONG ANTS 



assault of their fellows, and succumbed with little or no 

 effort to resist. They seemed to have the carriage of 

 persons detected in some meanness or crime a " hang- 

 dog'' sort of air. 



Could it be that these unfortunates tacitly recognized 

 the fact that they had become obnoxious to the com- 

 munal police? And, although this had come about by 

 no fault of their own, was their instinctive sense of 

 obligation to submit to the " legal authority' which 

 dominated the commune so imperative that they 

 yielded themselves to their fate, temporary captivity 

 or death as the case might be, without the least show 

 of resistance? One's judgment is so apt to be biassed 

 by his interest in and sympathy with these wise little 

 creatures that he is inclined to distrust even his most 

 careful observations, and fear that unconsciously he may 

 have interpreted their behavior by the operations of 

 his own mind. But in this case so many tests were 

 made, all yielding like results, that the above conclusion 

 seemed to be justified. 



And why should it not be so ? The higher animals are 

 not insensible to the public sentiment of their kind, 

 as one may see from the actions of domestic flocks and 

 herds and of gregarious wild beasts. It is what might 

 be looked for in social insects, though therein less notice- 

 able by human senses; for ages of hereditary com- 

 munal life must have wrought upon their sensibilities, 

 so keen in certain quarters though defective in others, 

 a marked response to an environment of active dis- 

 approbation. 



One does not speak of this as a conscience, perhaps not 

 even as a remote analogue thereof. But it seems to take 

 the place of that sentiment, or experience, or inward 



15 



