50 PERFECT SOCIETIES OF INSECTS. 



differ from those of the Termites in having inactive lar- 

 vae and pupae, the neuters or workers combining in them- 

 selves both the military and civil functions. Besides the 

 helpless larvse and pupae, which have no locomotive 

 powers, these societies consist of females, males, and 

 workers. The office of the females, at their first exclu- 

 sion distinguished by a pair of ample wings, (which how- 

 ever, as you have heard, they soon cast,) is the founda- 

 tion of new colonies, and the furnishing of a constant 

 supply of eggs for the maintenance of the population in 

 the old nests as well as in the new. These are usually 

 the least numerous part of the community a . The office 

 of the males, which are also winged, and at the time of 

 swarming are extremely numerous, is merely the im- 

 pregnation of the females : after the season for this is 

 passed, they die. Upon the workers b devolves, except 

 in nascent colonies, all the work, as well as the defence 

 of the community, of which they are the most numerous 

 portion. In some societies of ants the workers are of 

 two dimensions. In the nests of F. rufa audjlava such 

 were observed by Gould, the size of one exceeding that 



a Gould says that the males and females are nearly equal in num- 

 ber, p. 62 ; but from Huber's observations it seems to follow that the 

 former are most numerous, p. 96. 



b That the neuter ants, like those of the hive-bee, are imperfectly 

 organized females, appears from the following observation of M. Hu- 

 ber (Nouv. Observ. fyc. ii. 443.) " Les fourmis nous ont encore offert 

 a cet egard une analogic tres frappante; a laverite, nous n'avonsja- 

 mais vu pondre les ouvrieres, mais nous avons etc temoins de leur 

 accouplement. Ce fait pourroit etre atteste par plusieurs membres 

 de la Societe d'Histoire Naturelle de Geneve, a qui nous 1'avons fait 

 voir; 1'approche du male etoit toujoprs suivie de la mort de 1'ou- 

 vriere; leur conformation ne permet done pas qu'elles deviennent 

 meres, mais 1'instinct du male prouve du moins que ce sont des fe- 

 melles," 



