HYMENOPTERA. 



393 



wounded. The miners pursue the pillagers, and snatch their plunder 

 from them. But they are sometimes driven back vigorously, and 



i' the russet ants gain their lair with the plunder. 

 ! The tactics of the Red Ants {For?nica sanguinea) differ from those 

 of the russet. They only sally forth in small detachments, which 

 i; begin by engaging in skirmishes with the scouts thrown out round 

 • the enemy's ant-hill. Couriers, despatched from time to time to the 

 camp of the red ants, bring up reinforcements. When the troop 

 ; feels itself sufficiently strong, it invades the nest of the ashy-black 

 'lants, and cames off their offspring, which the latter have not had 

 "'iLtime to secure. Sometimes, also, the red ants instal themselves in 

 10 1 



•"ig. 371. — Philanthus triangulum. 



Fig. 372.— Mutilla Europaea, male and female. 



he nest whose inhabitants they have ejected, and transfer their own 

 )opulation to it. The motive for this emigration is that the old nest 

 las become useless, or that it is exposed to some danger. The red 

 mts are not the only ants which thus desert their birthplace. Many 

 ipecies abandon it likewise, for analogous motives, and construct 

 :lsewhere another dwelling, to which they transport all the population 

 )f the first nest. 



When we reflect on the habits of ants, we are forced to admit 

 hat intelligence and reason appear still more in their acts than in 

 hose of bees. The life of ants, as well as that of bees, as far as we 

 fxe concerned, is an unintelligible enigma. The acts of animals, in 

 ■:eneral, are sometimes an abyss unfathomable to our reason. The 

 Orientals say, "The last word may be written on man: on the 

 iephant, never !" Let us add that they should no m.ore say that 

 he elephant will be an inexhaustible theme, but that the history of 

 hie ant will continue so always. 



The best-known genera of the Fossores, or Fossorial Hymenop- 

 era, are PhilaTithus (Fig. 371), which feeds its larvae on bees, having 

 rst numbed them by its sting ; Fompilus and Sphex, which attack 



