220 



The Scottish Naturalist. 



their species. After remaining in the nest for a longer or 

 shorter period, varying, I fancy, according to the state of the 

 weather, the males and females fly into the air, and pair there ; 

 after which the males perish, and probably many of the 

 females. The survivors are either taken possession of by some 

 worker-ants of the same species, and brought into the nest, 

 which they are never again allowed to leave, or else they make 

 small nests for themselves, where they lay their eggs and attend 

 to the young in the same manner as the workers do.* The 

 swarms of males and females flying in the air are sometimes 

 exceedingly great. They often frequent high places, such as 

 church spires ; and it has happened more than once that the 

 great swarms of ants flying about a spire have been mistaken 

 for smoke, and led to the supposition that the building was 

 on fire. 



After the female ant has been impregnated, and either been 

 taken into a nest, or made a nest for herself, she has, of course, 

 no further use for her wings ; she therefore takes an early oppor- 

 tunity of getting rid of them. Hubert and others have witnessed 

 this proceeding, and seen how the ants worked their wings 

 about till they fell off. Sometimes, too, the worker ants are 

 said to assist them in this extraordinary procedure. 



The worker or neuter ants (of which there are two sizes, the 

 larger much less numerous than the smaller) are never provided 

 with wings. It has not, I believe, been clearly ascertained how 

 these worker ants are produced, — that is to say, how they are 

 prevented from developing into perfect males or females. 

 Worker bees, we know, are produced by the female larvae being 

 fed upon a less nutritious food than that with which the larvae 

 destined to become queens are nourished ; but the difference 

 between a worker and a female ant is much greater than that 

 between a worker and a queen bee. For not only, in the ant, 

 are the organs of sex totally obliterated, but the shape of the 

 thorax is quite different, not to mention the absence of wings. 

 Upon the worker ants falls all the labour connected with the 

 nes t — it is they who construct it, who tend the eggs, larvae, and 

 pupae, and who have to collect food for themselves and their 

 nurslings. 



* Huber no. t 109. Gould, 59, &c. 



