PERFECT SOCIETIES OF INSECTS, 75 
carnage of Myrmidonian wars, I shall next bring forward 
a scene still more astonishing, which at first, perhaps, you 
will be disposed to regard as the mere illusion of a lively 
imagination. What will you say when I tell you that cer- 
tain ants are affirmed to sally forth from their nests on 
predatory expeditions, for the singular purpose of pro- 
curing slaves to employ in their domestic business ; and 
that these ants are usually a ruddy race, while their slaves 
themselves are black? I think I see you here throw down 
my letter and exclaim—* What ! ants turned slave-deal- 
ers! This is a fact so extraordinary and improbable, 
and so out of the usual course of nature, that nothing but 
the most powerful and convincing evidence shall induce 
me to believe it.” In this I perfectly approve your cau- 
tion; such a solecism in nature ought not to be believed 
till it has undergone the ordeal of a most thorough inves- 
tigation. Unfortunately in this country we have not the 
means of satisfying ourselves by ocular demonstration, 
since none of the slave-dealing ants appear to be natives 
of Britain. We must be satisfied, therefore, with weigh- 
ing the evidence of others. Hear what M. P. Huber, the 
discoverer of this almost incredible deviation of nature 
from her general laws, has advanced to convince the world 
of the accuracy of his statement, and you will, I am sure, 
allow that he has thrown over his history a colouring of 
verisimilitude, and that his appeal to testimony is in a 
very high degree satisfactory. 
** 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 
a interest to my narration, [ have given way to an 
inclination to embellish the facts that I have ebserved. 
