1894. NOTES AND COMMENTS. 407 



Some sceptics say that birds must be very foolish creatures to be 

 deceived by certain so-called protective resemblance ; but the birds 

 in Madagascar must be very old birds indeed if they often get a meal 

 ofif either of these marvellous examples of mimicry. 



The Ways of the White Ant. 



An example of individual adaptation of somewhat different 

 nature was also to be seen at the soiree of the Royal Society, in 

 the case of Termite ants exhibited by Dr. D. Sharp. We have 

 already alluded to the recent work of Grassi and Sandias on the two 

 European species of this family (Natural Science, vol. iv., p. 312), a 

 work that has stimulated afresh our curiosity as to the social economy 

 and the physiology of the white ants. As has been partly explained 

 by Dr. Cunningham in our own pages (vol. iv., p. 287), Grassi has 

 arrived at the conclusion that the various forms making up the 

 species of a Termes are produced at will by the community from 

 similar individuals of an " undifferentiated " nature. His statements, 

 in fact, amount to this, that the continuation of the species being 

 confided by the community to a single pair, the produce of this 

 couple is made into the various castes required by the community by 

 means of processes of special feeding. Should the community require 

 a new royal pair, they apply to a certain number of individuals a 

 course of feeding by which the reproductive organs are brought into 

 full development and functional activity, while the external parts of 

 the body remain permanently in the pre-adult state. To such 

 individuals the name " neoteinic," ^ or " permanently adolescent," has 

 been applied. Their number is afterwards reduced by the community 

 to a single pair. 



Dr. Sharp's exhibit included some 10 or 12 species of Termites 

 that had been collected at Singapore by Mr. G. D. Haviland, and 

 each species was represented by many of its various forms and most 

 of the stages of individual development. In the nest of one species 

 Mr. Haviland had found about 10 neoteinic pairs, leading to the 

 belief that in this species also an economy prevails similar to that in 

 Termes lucifugiis, as described by Grassi. This Singapore collection, 

 which contains a large number of specimens, all in a perfect state 

 of preservation, has been presented by Mr. Haviland to the Museum of 

 Cambridge University. 



Botany ; British and Foreign. 



The May issue of the Journal of Botany contains descriptions of 

 some of the new plants recently collected by Dr. J. W. Gregory in 



1 For explanation of term "neoteinic," see KoUmann, Verh. Gcs. Basel, vii., 

 1883, p. 391 ; also Camerano, BvU. Soc. Ent. Hal , 1S85, p. Sg, and Atti Ace. Torino, 

 xix., p. 84 



