552 INSECT MISCELLANIES. 



tors, but bestow the greatest care upon their larvae 

 and pupge, their males and females, and even evince the 

 same regard for themselves, transporting them from 

 one part of the colony to another, going in search of 

 provisions for them, building their habitation — form- 

 ing, as occasion requires, new galleries, and fulfilling 

 the duties of sentinels, by guarding the exterior of 

 their common abode, apparently not once suspecting 

 that they live with those very insects which kidnapped 

 them in their helpless and unconscious infancy. 

 Whilst the negro-ants are engaged in these laborious 

 employments, their masters rest tranquilly at the bot- 

 tom of their subterranean city till the hour fixed for 

 their expeditions arrives ; reserving their strength, 

 courage, and skill in tactics, for the purpose of bring- 

 ing in from some adjacent colony hundreds of pupae 

 which they confide to the charge of their slaves.'* 



It is most justly remarked by Kirby and Spence, 

 that, although providence has gifted these creatures 

 with an instinct so extraordinary, and seemingly so 

 unnatural, it does not prove, as in the instance of 

 human slavery, a source of misery to the slaves them- 

 selves ; for their situation is little, if at all, different 

 from what it would have been had they never been 

 carried from their native colony ; and they are ex- 

 posed to no unusual hardships or oppression in conse- 

 quence of their change of residence. It may be said, 

 indeed, that they have to perform serious additional 

 labours for their warlike masters ; but this objection 

 w.ll disappear when the minute division of labour 

 among ants is taken into account, and when we con- 

 sider that these slaves are commonly very numerous. 

 Above all, it is to be recollected that the species of 

 ants captured appear to place their chief pleasure in 

 incessant labour, and would be as miserable,- if com- 

 pelled to be idle, as the poor animals which we see 

 confined in menageries without space for exercise, 



* Iluber, ut supra ^ 271. 



