2 B. GBASSI AND A. SANDIAS.- 



forms of a golden-yellow colour, with the compound eyes almost 

 always pigmented, with or without wing-buds and with the 

 abdomen dilated, particularly in the female, which as a rule 

 did not possess the genital appendices. In the majority of 

 examples the wing-rudiments were absent or very short, but 

 exceptionally they approximated in length to those of a nymph. 

 Sometimes one member of the royal pair did, and the other 

 did not possess wing-buds. 



The nests not infrequently contained eggs, but never a true 

 royal pair. 



2. Either the king or queen alone was removed in the 

 spring from about a dozen nests. After October each nest 

 contained a yellow, i. e. substitute king, associated with a 

 black queen if the king had been taken away ; if the queen, a 

 black king with a yellow queen. Therefore the true royal 

 form which had been removed was still wanting. 



Corollary. — After loss of the royal forms the orphaned 

 nest furnishes a pair of substitute forms; if one only is 

 missing, it is replaced by a substitute of the same sex, and in 

 such cases a black example mates with a yellow. 



Individuals capable of reaching sexual maturity are selected 

 for development into substitute forms, but the most advanced, 

 the nymphs, are not preferred. 



3. Many nests orphaned in July, August, and September 

 provided themselves with a substitute royal pair, notwithstand- 

 ing that perfect examples, that is, black and with fully formed 

 wings, were abundant in those months. 



Corollary. — Orphaned nests do not have recourse to perfect 

 insects in order to provide themselves with a king or queen. 

 There is no justification for the belief that nests orphaned at 

 the swarra-period adopt a pair of perfect insects, because 

 thickly populated nests are never found naturally to contain a 

 king and queen of small size. 



4. Certain nests orphaned in March and April and reopened 

 in June and July contained a limited number only (six or 

 eight to twenty) of royal substitutes, which were still sexually 

 immature. 



