356 ILLUSTRATIVE NOTES. 
without discouraging it. Then he grew tired, and moreover he was full of 
admiration. The ant conquered. So he said: “Let us imitate it. We too 
will conquer as the ant has done.” But for the ant, the hero had missed the 
Empire of Asia. 
NOTE 14.—Book iii., Chap. iii. 
Flocks of the Ants.—Nearly every plant nourishes grubs, which are embel- 
lished with the most varied, and frequently the most dazzling colours. The 
rose-tree aphis, when I examined it through a microscope, seemed to me of a 
very pleasant bright green. Thrown on its back, it displayed a very big belly, 
and a very small ungainly head, which appeared to be neither more nor less 
than a sucker, while it agitated all its limbs. On the whole, I took it to be an 
innocent creature, which should inspire no repugnant feeling. One can under- 
stand how the ants absorb the honey-dew upon its body. (See Bonnet and 
others, in reference to their prodigious fecundity.) 
NOTE 15.—Book iii., Chap. v. 
The Wasps.—Before speaking of this terrible species, in which, perhaps, we 
see revealed the loftiest energy of nature, I ought to have spoken of its modest 
neighbour, the drone. Réaumur, who is not sufficiently known as a writer, 
and who frequently displays much grace of style, says, very pleasingly, that 
the poor drones, in their rough little societies, when compared with the 
royal communities of the wasps and bees, are mere rustics or savages, and 
