364 AFFECTION OF INSECTS FOR THEIR YOUNG. 



same may be said of wasps, ants, and termites, of which, 

 though there is a vast variety of different kinds, we are 

 acquainted with the history of but a very few. You will 

 not therefore expect more than a sketch of the most in- 

 teresting traits of affection for their young, manifested by 

 the common species of each genus. 



One circumstance must be premised with regard to the 

 education of the young of most of those insects which live 

 in society, truly extraordinary, and without parallel in 

 any other department of nature : namely, that this office, 

 except under particular circumstances, is not undertaken 

 by the female which has given birth to them, but by the 

 workers, or neuters as they are sometimes called, which, 

 though bound to the offspring of the common mother of 

 the society by no other than fraternal ties, exhibit towards 

 them all the marks of the most ardent parental affection, 

 building habitations for their use, feeding them and tend- 

 ing them with incessant solicitude, and willingly sacrifi- 

 cing their lives in defence of the precious charge. Thus 

 sterility itself is made an instrument of the preservation 

 and multiplication of species ; and females too fruitful to 

 educate all their young, are indulged by Providence with 

 a privilege without which nine tenths of their progeny 

 must perish. 



The most determined despiser of insects and their con- 

 cerns he who never deigned to open his eyes to any 

 other part of their economy must yet have observed, 

 even in spite of himself, the remarkable attachment which 

 the inhabitants of a disturbed nest of ants manifest to- 

 wards certain small white oblong bodies with which it is 

 usually stored. He must have perceived that the ants are 

 much less intently occupied with providing for their own 



