388 THE INSECT WOELD. 



with any great danger, take on their shoulders the eggs, the 

 larvae, the pupae, and sometimes those females and the males 

 which refuse to follow them. Thus laden, they go their way, 

 Anchises like, to seek for another country they may call their 

 own. They never forget, in their hurried emigrations, the 

 infirm or sick workers, which would perish in the house now 

 abandoned and deserted. 



The males and females lately hatched do not enjoy the same 

 liberty as the young workers. They are confined to the ant-hill, 

 where they are kept in sight till the day of the general 

 departure. It is towards the end of the month of August that 

 swarms of winged ants of both sexes are seen to issue forth. 

 The males come out first, agitating their iridescent and trans- 

 parent wings. The females, less numerous, follow them closely. 

 All of a sudden, one sees this troop raise itself at a given signal, 

 and disappear in the air, where the coupling takes place. The 

 males perish immediately afterwards. The females impregnated 

 return to the paternal home, or else found new colonies, with 

 the assistance of a few workers who are their escort. From 

 this moment, they no longer require wings. The workers make 

 haste to cut them off, or, indeed, which oftenest happens, they 

 themselves tear them off. With their wings they lose the desire 

 for liberty. Henceforward, they will quit their retreat no more ; 

 the cares of their approaching maternity now alone occupying them. 

 The working ants reserve for them subterranean chambers, where 

 they are kept in sight by the sentinels. At certain hours only 

 are they to be met with in the upper stories. When they wish 

 to walk, a company of guards presses round them on all sides, 

 so as to prevent them from advancing too quickly. There are no 

 sorts of attentions they do not heap upon them to make them 

 forget their captivity. They caress them, brush them, lick them, 

 they offer them food continually. On the least appearance of 

 danger, the workers take possession, first of all, of the pregnant 

 females, and drag them out by the secret outlets, so as to put 

 in a place of safety their precious persons, the hope of the com- 

 munity. The workers' task is immense, for their labours increase 

 in the same proportion as the population increases. But the 

 division of work and the good understanding which exists between 



