HABITATIONS OF INSECTS. 433 



spacious symmetrical apartments, we should eagerly in- 

 quire into the history of the inhabitants, and sigh over 

 the remains of a race whose intellectual advances we 

 should infer with certainty were not inferior to our own. 



Were we by the same test to estimate the sagacity of 

 the different classes of animals, we should beyond all 

 doubt assign the highest place to insects, which in the 

 construction of their habitations leave all the rest far be- 

 hind. The nests of birds, from the rook's rude assem- 

 blage of sticks to the pensile dwellings of the tailor-bird, 

 wonderful as they doubtless are, are indisputably eclipsed 

 by the structures formed by many insects ; and the re- 

 gular villages of the beaver, by far the most sagacious 

 architect amongst quadrupeds, must yield the palm to a 

 wasp's nest. You will think me here guilty of exaggera- 

 tion, and that, blinded by my attachment to a favourite 

 pursuit, I am elevating the little objects, which I wish to 

 recommend to your study, to a rank beyond their just 

 claim. So far, however, am I from being conscious of 

 any such prejudice, that I do not hesitate to go further, 

 and assert that the pyramids of Egypt, as the work of 

 man, are not more wonderful for their size and solidity 

 than are the structures built by some insects. 



To describe the most remarkable of these is my pre- 

 sent object : and that some method may be observed, I 

 shall in this letter describe the habitations of insects living 

 in a state of solitude, and built each by a single architect ; 

 and in a subsequent one, those of insects living in socie- 

 ties, built by the united labours of many. The former 

 class may be conveniently subdivided into habitations 

 built by the parent insect, not for its own use, but for the 

 convenience of its future young ; and those which are 



VOL. i. 2 F 



