THE NATURAL 



the origin of a new state. The expeditions of travelling 

 termites, common as fighting termites in South Africa, 

 are naturally directed by soldiers. Sparmann (cited in 

 Guerin's Dictionnaire d'histoire naturelle) observed 

 them during his voyage to the Cape, and says they be- 

 have rather as non-coms in close rank, or climbing onto 

 grass blades, watch the defile, beating with their feet, 

 if the order were bad, or too slow. The signal is at once 

 understood, and obeyed by the rank at once, is answered 

 by a whistle. There is in this something so marvellous 

 that one hesitates to accept the traveller's interpreta- 

 tion in entirety. It is not the spontaneous and mechani- 

 cal discipline of the ants, but the consenting obedience, 

 so difficult to obtain from inferior humanities. After 

 all, nothing is impossible, and without being credulous 

 in these matters, one need be astonished at nothing. 

 Nevroptera are, moreover, exceeding old on the earth; 

 they date from before the coal-beds: their civilization is 

 some thousands of centuries older than human civiliza- 

 tions. 



Beavers are the only mammals, man excepted, whose 

 industry indicates an intelligence near that of insects. 

 But their societies offer no complication, they are a 

 simple grouping of couples. They do not construct their 

 dams until the females have been delivered, this hap- 

 pens toward the end of July, one sees no other con- 

 nection between their sexual habits and their remark- 

 able works. 



These enormous trees felled and made to lie where 

 intended, these piles stuck in the river-bed and inter- 

 bound with twisted branches, these impermeable dams, 

 170 



