INSECTS IN GENERAL. 1^1 



or nymphs of the neuter ants in the habitation, and transport 

 them, still pursuing the same order, to their own proper do- 

 micile. Other neuter ants of the conquered species, born 

 among these warriors, and formerly kidnapped in their 

 larva state, take care of the newly-imported larvse, as well 

 as of the posterity of their ravishers. 



We might enter here into many further details concerning 

 the societies of insects, only that our limits forbid it, and 

 that they will come with more propriety vmder some future 

 heads. What we have done in this way was necessary to 

 render our general observations intelligible. From every 

 thing respecting such societies, this consequence may be de- 

 duced — the laws which govern the societies of insects, those 

 even which appear to us the most anomalous, constitute a sys- 

 tem combined with the most profound wisdom, and established 

 from the beginning, not resulting from accident. Such a 

 consideration should elevate our thoughts with a religious 

 respect towards that Eternal Intelligence, which, in giving 

 existence to so many various beings, has thought proper to 

 perpetuate their generations by means sure and invariable in 

 their operation, concealed from our feeble reason, but ever to 

 be regarded with the most intense admiration. 



Notwithstanding that we have, perhaps, transgressed the 

 limits to which the character of our Work necessarily confines 

 us, in this introductory essay, we yet feci that much of the 

 greatest interest has been left unnoticed, and that the sketch 

 is, upon the whole, meagre, feeble and imperfect. But the 

 candid reader will overlook this, when he considers the vast- 

 ness of the subject, even in the most general way of viewing it, 

 and the impossibility of entering at large into details, which 

 might yet be deemed indispensably necessary, to illustrate 

 our observations. If Messrs. Kirby and Spence have given 

 to their magnificent work, in four large volumes, the modest 

 title of an Introduction, how was it possible for us to com- 



