Author's Preface 



sake of a family which their faceted eyes will 

 never behold, but which is nevertheless no 

 stranger to the mother's powers of foresight. 

 One turns cotton-spinner and produces cot- 

 ton-wool bottles ; another sets up as a basket- 

 maker and weaves hampers out of bits of 

 leaves; a third becomes a mason and builds 

 rooms of cement and domes of road-metal; 

 a fourth opens pottery-works, where clay 

 is kneaded into shapely vases and rounded 

 pots; yet another goes in for mining and 

 digs mysterious underground chambers in 

 the warm, moist earth. A thousand trades 

 similar to ours and often even unknown 

 to our industrial system enter into the 

 preparation of the abode. Next comes the 

 provisions for the expected nurselings: piles 

 of honey, loaves of pollen, stores of game, 

 preserved by a cunning paralysing-process. 

 In such works as these, having the future of 

 the family for their sole object, the highest 

 manifestations of Instinct are displayed 

 under the stimulus of maternity. 



So far as the rest of the insect race is con- 

 cerned, the mother's cares are generally most 

 summary. In the majority of cases, all that 

 is done is to lay the eggs in a favourable spot, 

 where the larva, at its own risk and peril, 

 can find bed and breakfast. With such 



