THE WEB OF LIFE 333 



in the co-operation, e.g. of sewing two leaves together 

 or of carrying a heavy burden, nothing more than the 

 ' coincidence of purely individual activities '. Of course 

 the activities must be individual, just as in a human 

 society, but they may be combined in a joint enterprise 

 whose result is for the benefit of the community rather 

 than of the single life. 



Termites. — Parallel to the true ants in their social life, 

 very divergent in almost every other respect, are the so- 

 called ' white ants ' or Termites of warm countries — 

 Africa, India, Australia, etc. They are usually referred 

 to the order Neuroptera, whereas the true ants are Hymen- 

 opterous. While there is great variety in their social 

 organization, it may be said that the Termite community 

 usually consists of (1) workers, (2) soldiers, and (3) the 

 reproductive individuals, or kings and queens. In most 

 cases there is but one mature royal pair, around which 

 the life of the community centres ; but numerous young 

 ' kings ' and ' queens ' are produced, which are winged 

 and leave the termitary after a few days in great swarms 

 which often come to nought. The mature ' kiags ' and 

 ' queens ' lose their wings. The organization is compU- 

 cated in various ways, for instance by the occurrence of 

 what Grassi called complementary kings and queens, which 

 the workers keep in reserve lest anything befall the reigning 

 pair. They are kept in a somehow inhibited state of 

 development, but can be brought up to the reproductive 

 level in a short time. 



The workers illustrate arrested development ; they 

 may be regarded as ' permanent children ' of both 

 sexes, whereas the workers among ants and bees are all 

 arrestments on the female side. 



