n8 ASSOCIATION OF ORGANISMS THE WEB OF LIFE 



The most important and arduous duty of the workers is to 

 look after the eggs, larvae, and pupae, and these are distributed 

 through the nest with due regard to variations of moisture and 

 temperature, since both of these affect development. The queens 

 are carefully tended, and their eggs are carried off to suitable 

 chambers. From time to time these are carefully licked, and it 

 is also said that they are smeared with nutritious fluid that is 

 absorbed by the embryos. When the larvae hatch out they are 

 fed with great assiduity and their toilet requirements attended to. 

 The full-grown larvae spin cocoons, within which they become 

 pupae (the so-called "ants' eggs"), which also receive unremitting 

 attention. The workers bite away the enclosing cocoons when 

 the perfect insects are ready to come out. Some of them are 

 workers, others winged males and females which fly about in 

 swarms. After mating, the large majority of the swarming in- 

 dividuals perish, but some of the females survive to found fresh 

 communities, or sometimes to be taken into existing nests. 



The stings of Wood-Ants are not sufficiently well developed 

 to be of use, but their poison-bags contain formic acid, which can 

 be squirted to a considerable distance, and is an effective defence. 

 This particular acid, as its name indicates (L. formica, an ant), 

 was first known as a product of insect-life. The strong mandibles 

 of the workers are also weapons of no despicable character. These 

 ants co-operate for offence and defence, and Lord Avebury (in 

 Ants, Bees, and Wasps] thus describes their tactics, and those of a 

 related species: ''Formica rufa, the common Horse Ant, attacks 

 in serried masses, seldom sending out detachments, while single 

 ants scarcely ever make individual attacks. They rarely pursue 

 a flying foe, but give no quarter, killing as many enemies as pos- 

 sible, and never hesitating, with this object, to sacrifice themselves 

 for the common good. Formica exsecta is a delicate, but very 

 active, species. They also advance in serried masses, but in close 

 quarters they bite right and left, dancing about to avoid being 

 bitten themselves. When fighting with larger species they spring 

 on to their backs, and then seize them by the neck or by an 

 antenna. They also have the instinct of acting together, three 

 or four seizing an enemy at once, and then pulling different 

 ways, so that she on her part cannot get at any one of her 

 foes. One of them then jumps on her back and cuts, or rather 

 saws, off her head. In battles between this ant and the much 



