^fiftPfiCt SOCIEtlES or INSECTS. 29 



he is gifted with the divine faculty of speech, and can 

 express his thoughts by articulate sounds or artificial 

 language. — Not so our social insects. Every species 

 has its peculiar mode of proceeding, to which it adheres 

 as to the law of its nature, never deviating but under 

 the control of imperious circumstances ; for in parti- 

 cular instances, as you will see when I come to treat 

 of their instincts, they know how to vary, though not 

 very materially, from the usual mode''. But they ne- 

 ver depart, like man, from the general system ; and, in 

 common with the rest of the animal kingdom, they have 

 no articulate lano-uas^e. 



Human associations, under the direction of reason 

 and revelation, are also formed with higher views, — I 

 mean as to government, morals, and religion : — with 

 respect to the last of these, the social insects of course 

 can have nothing to do, except that by their wonderful 

 proceedings they give man an occasion of glorifying his 

 great Creator ; but in their instincts, extraordinary as 

 it may seem, they exhibit a semblance of the two 

 former, as will abundantly appear in the course of our 

 correspondence. 



I shall not detain you longer by prefatory remarks 

 from the amusing scene to which I am eager to intro- 

 duce you; but the following observations of M. P. Hu- 

 ber on this subject are so just and striking, that 1 can- 

 not refrain from copying them. 



* Plusieurs d'entre eux (Insectes) savent user de ressources ingenienses 

 dans les cirronstances difficiles: ils sortent alors de leur routine accou- 

 tiimee et srmblent agir d'apres la position dans laquelle ils se frouvent; 

 c'est la sans dovite Tun des plier.omenes Ics plus curieux de I'histoire, na- 

 turclle. Huber, Nouvelles ObscrvttUuns t,iir las Jbcilks, n. 19S.— Compare 

 alio ibid. 250, note K. B. 



