PERFECT SOCIETIES OF INSECTS. 2/ 



and to raise works of munition that may resist liis at- 

 tack. 



The main instrument of association is language, and 

 no association can be perfect where there is not a qom- 

 mon tongue. The origin of nationality was difference 

 of speech :— at Babel, when tongues were divided, na- 

 tions separated. Language may be understood in a 

 larger sense than to signify inflections of the voice, — it 

 may well include all the means of making yourself un- 

 derstood by another, whetiicr by sounds, gestures, signs, 

 or words : the two first of tliese kinds may be called na- 

 tural language, and the two last arbitrary or artificial. 



I have said that perfect societies of insects exhibit 

 the semblance o£ii nearer approach, both in their prin- 

 ciple and its results, to the societies of man himself, 

 because, unless we could perfectly understand what in- 

 stinct is, and how it acts, we cannot, without exposing 

 ourselves to the charge of temerity, assert that these 

 are precisely the same. 



But when we consider the object of these societies, 

 the preservation and multiplication of the species; and 

 the means by which that object is attained, the united 

 labours and cooperation of perhaps millions of indivi- 

 duals, it seems as if they were impelled by passions 

 very similar to those main-springs of human associa- 

 tions, which I have just enumerated. Desire appears 

 to stimulate tliem — love to allure them — fear to alarm 

 them. They want a habitation to reside in, and food 

 for their subsistence. Does not this look as if desire 

 were the operating cause, which induces them to unite 

 their labours to construct the one and provide the 

 other ? Their nests contain a numerous faniily of help-! 



