so PERFECT SOCIETIES OF INSECTS. 



he has far outstripped all his predecessors. — Such are 

 the sources from which the following account of ants i& 

 principally drawn, intermixed with which you will find 

 some occasional observations, — which your partiality 

 to your friend may, perhaps, induce you to think not 

 wholly devoid of interest^ — that it has been my fortune 

 to make. 



The societies of ants, as also of other Hi/menoptera, 

 differ from those of the Termites in having inactive 

 larvae and pupae, the neuters or workers combining in 

 themselves both the military and civil functions. Be- 

 sides the helpless larvcB and pupae, which have no lo- 

 comotive powers, these societies consist of females, 

 males, and workers. The office of the females, at their 

 first exclusion distinguished by a pair of ample wings, 

 (which however, as you have heard, they soon cast,) 

 is the foundation of new colonies, and the furnishing of 

 a constant supply of eggs for the maintenance of the 

 population in the old nests as well as in the new. These 

 are usually the least numerous part of the community^. 

 The office of the males, which are also winged, and at 

 the time of swarming are extremely numerous, is 

 merely the impregnation of the females : after the sea- 

 son for this is passed, they die. Upon the workers^ de- 



" Gould says that the males and females are nearly equal in number, 

 p. 62 ; but from Huber's observations it seems to follow that the former 

 are most numerous, p. 9G. 



*" That the neuter ants, like those of the hive-bee, are imperfectly or- 

 ganized females, appears from the following observation of M. Huber 

 {Pfouv. Observ. &;c. n. 443.) — " Les fonrmis nous ont encore offert a cet 

 cgard une analogic tres frappante: a la verite, nous n'avons jamais vu 

 pondre les onvrieres, mais nousavons etetemoins dcleur accouplement. 

 Ce fait pourroLt ttre atteste par plusieurs membres de la Societe d'Hi)^ 



