Microscopical Essays. 305 



1110ft remarkable circumftanee in the form of the head and mouth * 

 lor in the former flate the mouth is evidently calculated for gnaw- 

 ing and holding bodies ; but in this flate, the jaws being fhaped 

 juft like two very (harp awls a little jagged, they are incapable of 

 any thing but piercing or wounding, for which purpofes they are 

 very effectual, being as hard as a crabs claw, and placed in a 

 ftrong homey head, which is of a nut-brown colour, and larger 

 than all" the reft of the body together, which feems to labour un- 

 der great difficulty in carrying it : on which account, perhaps, 

 the animal is incapable of climbing up perpendicular furfaces. 



The third order, or the infect in it's perfect flate, varies it's form 

 ftill more than ever ; the head, thorax, and abdomen, differ 

 almoft entirely from the fame parts in the labourers and foldiers $ 

 and befides this, the animal is now furnilhed with four fine large 

 brownifh tranfparent wings, with which it is, at the time of emi- 

 gration, to wing it's way in fearch of a new fettlement : in fhort, 

 it differs fo much from it's form and appearance in the two other 

 ftates, that it has never been fuppofed to be the fame animal, but 

 by thofe who have feen it in the fame neft - y and fome of thefe have 

 diftrufted the evidence of their fenfes. It was fo long before Mi\ 

 Smeathman met with them in the nefts, that he doubted the in- 

 formation which was given him by the natives, that they 

 belonged to the fame family : indeed, you may open twenty nefts 

 without finding one winged one ; for thofe are to be found only 

 juft before the commencement of the rainy feafon, when they un- 

 dergo the laft change, which is preparative to their colonization, 

 Add to this, they fometimes abandon an outward part of their 

 building, the community being diminifhed by fome accident that 

 is unknown ; fometimes different fpecies of the real ant (formica) 



p p poffefs 



