" To him who is satisfied with amassing collections of curious objects, 

 simply for the pleasure of possessing them, such objects can afford, at best, 

 but a childish gratification, faint and fleeting ; while he who extends his 

 view beyond the narrow field of nomenclature, beholds a boundless expanse, 

 the exploring of which is worthy of the philosopher, and of the best talents 

 of a reasonable being." BURCHELL, "Southern Africa " 1, 505 (1822). 



" Field study of the Formicidae is certainly becoming much more interest- 

 ing and precise through our increasing knowledge of dulosis and temporary 

 social parasitism, since every ant colony examined no longer represents to 

 the observer merely a meaningless aggregate of individuals, but a definite 

 stage in the life-cycle of a colonial organism. Thus the myrmecologist is 

 prompted to attack a host of fascinating problems suggested by the origin, 

 development and decline, both onto- and phylogenetic, of a living com- 

 munity and the instinctive processes involved in the numerical regulation of 

 its polymorphic components." WHEELER, "Bull. Amer. Mus. Nat. Hist." 

 24, 645 (1908). 



" Myrmecology has been more fortunate than many other branches of 

 entomology in the men who have contributed to its development. These 

 have been actuated, almost without exception, not by a mania for endless 

 multiplication of genera and species, but by a temperate and philosophical 

 interest in the increase of our knowledge." WHEELER, "Ants," 1910, p. 123. 



