xliii 



HABITS AND INSTINCTS. 



Two interesting communications from Herr Fritz Miiller to 

 Mr. Charles Darwin have appeared in 'Nature' (Nos. 225 and 

 237), in the former of which the writer, treating of the natural 

 history of the Brazilian Termites, states that he has come to the 

 same conclusion as Mr. Bates with respect to the neuters, — 

 namely, that these are not sterile females, but modified larva?, 

 which undergo no further metamorphosis ; that, in some species 

 of Calotermes the male soldiers may even externally be distin- 

 guished from the female soldiers ; and that in the company of 

 the queen there always lives a king, as observed by Smeathman a 

 century ago, but doubted by most subsequent writers. He has 

 also recognised the existence of two forms of sexual individuals ; 

 the one, consisting of iv'mged males and females, produced in vast 

 numbers and leaving the termitary in large swarms ; the other, of 

 wingless males and females, which never quit the spot where they 

 are born. 



A similar result would appear to be attained thereby, as in the 

 case of the winged and wingless sexual races of the Phylloxera, 

 already referred to, the former serving to disperse the race ; the 

 latter to continue the labours of the original colony by successive 

 broods. 



The writer subsequently adverts to another " interesting group 

 of social insects, the stingless honey-bees, Melipona and Tri- 

 gona." He mentions that in Melipona wax is secreted " on the 

 dorsal side of the abdomen," instead of on the ventral, as in hive- 

 bees ; that the Melipona and Trigone " fill their ceUs with semi- 

 digested food before the eggs are laid," and tbat they close the 

 cells " immediately after the queen has dropped an egg on the 

 food ; " whereas, in the hive-bee, the eggs are laid in nearly empty 

 cells, which the workers close with wax wlien the adult larva% 

 which they have been feeding, are about to undergo their pupa- 

 metamorphosis.* , • 1 o • + 



At a recent meeting of the French Entomological Society 



(December 9th), a paper on the habits of tbe Brazilian Mehponre 



and Trigona., by M. Maurice Girard, was read (although not yet 



published), from which it would appear that one of the former 



* Eeai;mur, 5 Mem. xi. pp. 575, 58i. 



