PERFECT SOCIETIES OF INSECTS. 329 



" My readers," says he, " will perhaps be tempted to believe that I have 

 suffered myself to be carried away by the love of the marvellous, and that, 

 in order to impart greater interest to my narration, I have given way to an 

 inclination to embellish the facts that I have observed. But the more the 

 wonders of nature have attractions for me, the less do I feel inclined to 

 alter them by a mixture of the reveries of imagination. I have sought to 

 divest myself of every illusion and prejudice, of the ambition of saying new 

 things, of the prepossessions often attached to perceptions too rapid, the 

 love of system, and the like. And I have endeavoured to keep myself, if 

 I may so say, in a disposition of mind perfectly neuter, and ready to admit 

 all facts, of whatever nature they might be, that patient observation should 

 confirm. Amongst the persons whom I have taken as witnesses to the 

 discovery of mixed ant-hills, I can cite a distinguished philosopher (Prof. 

 Jurine), who was desirous of verifying their existence by examining himself 

 the two species united." 1 



He afterwards appeals to nature, and calls upon all who doubt it to 

 repeat his experiments, which he is sure will soon satisfy them, a satis- 

 faction which, as I have just observed, in this country we cannot receive, 

 for want of the slave-making species. And now to begin my history. 



There are two species of ants which engage in these excursions, 

 Polyergus rufescens and Formica sanguinea ; but they do not, like the 

 African kings, make slaves of adults, their sole object being to carry off 

 the helpless infants of the colony which they attack, the larvae and pupae ; 

 these they educate in their own nests till they arrive at their perfect state, 

 when they undertake all the business of the society. 2 In the following 

 account I shall chiefly confine myself to what Huber relates of the first 

 of these species, and conclude my extracts with his history of an expedition 

 of the latter to procure slaves. 



The rufescent ants 3 do not leave their nests to go upon these expeditions, 

 which last about ten weeks, till the males are ready to emerge into the 

 perfect state ; and it is very remarkable, that if any individuals attempt to 

 stray abroad earlier, they are detained by their slaves, who will not suffer 

 them to proceed : a wonderful provision of the Creator to prevent the 

 black colonies from being pillaged when they contain only male and female 

 brood, which would be their total destruction, without being any benefit 

 to their assailants, to whom neuters alone are useful. 



Their time of sallying forth is from two in the afternoon till five, but 

 more generally a little before five; the weather, however, must be fine, 

 and the thermometer must stand at above 36 in the shade. Previously 

 to marching there is reason to think that they send out scouts to explore 

 the vicinity ; upon whose return they emerge from their subterranean city, 



1 Huber, 287. Jurine, Hymenopteres, 273. 



2 It is not clear that our Willughby had not some knowledge of this extraordi- 

 nary fact ; for in his description of ants, speaking of their care of their pupae, he 

 says, " that they also carry the aurelite of others into their nests, as if they were their 

 own." (Rai. Hist. Ins. 69.) Gould remarks concerning the hill-ant, "This species 

 is very rapacious after the vermides and nymphs of other ants. If you place a parcel 

 before or near their colonies, they will, with remarkable greediness, seize and carry 

 them off." 91. note*. Query Do they do this to devour them, or educate them? 

 White made the same observation (A T a<. Hist. ii. 278). 



3 This species forms a kind of link which connects Latreille's two genera Formica 

 and Myrmica, borrowing the abdominal squama from the former, and the sting 

 from the latter. 



