WHAT I SAW IN AN ANTS NEST. 335 



as is most likely, the differences between the grades of ter- 

 mites may have originally been produced by natural selection 

 or other causes, these differences have now become part and 

 parcel of the constitution of these insects, and are propagated 

 by the ordinary law of heredity. Thus acquired conditions 

 have become in time the natural "way of life" of these animals. 

 Mr. Bates has also placed on record the noteworthy fact 

 that a species of termites exists in which the members of 

 the soldier class did not differ at all from the workers " ex- 

 cept in the fighting instinct." This observation, if it may 

 be used at all in elucidation of the origin of the curious 

 family life of these insects, points not to sudden creation, 

 but to gradual acquirement and modification as having been 

 the method of development of the specialised classes and 

 castes in termite society. Firstly, we may thus regard the 

 beginnings of the further development of a colony to appear 

 in a nest in which workers and soldiers are alike, as stated 

 by Mr. Bates. Then, through the practice of the fighting 

 instinct, we may conceive that natural selection would be 

 competent to adapt the soldiers more perfectly for their 

 duties militant, by developing the head and jaws as offensive 

 weapons. Possibly, were our knowledge of the termites at 

 all complete, we should meet with all stages in the develop- 

 ment and specialisation of the various grades of society 

 amongst these insects, at least the present state of our 

 knowledge would seem to lead to such a conclusion as 

 being much more feasible than the theory of special or sudden 

 creation of the peculiarities of the race. It is admitted that 

 the termites are in many respects inferior in structure to the 

 bees and wasps, whilst the white ants themselves, are the 

 superiors of their own order that of the Neuroptera. That 

 the termites preceded the bees and their neighbours, the 

 common ants, in the order of development of social instincts 

 is a conclusion supported by the fact that the Neuroptera 

 form the first group of insects which are preserved to us 

 in the "records of the rocks." Fossil Neuroptera occur in 

 the Devonian rocks of North America; the first traces of 



