By Sir John Lubb'jch, Bart. 



55 



1. Join her own or some other old nest; 



fc. Associate herself with a certain number of workers and with 

 their assistance commence a new nest ; or 

 3. Found a new nest by herself. 



The question can, of course, only be settled by observation, and 

 the experiments made to determine it have hitherto been indecisive. 

 Blanchard indeed, in his work on the Metamorphoses of Insects (T 

 quote from Dr. Duncan's translation p. 2(>5) says, " Huber observed 

 a solitary female go down into a small underground hole, take off 

 her own wing's, and become, as it were, a worker; then she con- 

 structed a small nest, laid a few eggs, and brought up the larva? 

 by acting as mother and nurse at the same time." 



This however is not a correct version of what Huber says. His 

 words are : " I enclosed several females in a nest full of light humid 

 earth, with which they constructed lodges, where they resided ; some 

 singly, others in common. They laid their eggs and took great 

 care of them ; and notwithstanding the inconvenience of not being 

 able to vary the temperature of their habitation, they reared some, 

 which became larva? of a tolerable size, but which soon perished from 

 the effect of my own negligence " 



It will be observed that it was the eggs — not the larva? — which, 

 according to Huber, these isolated females reared. It is true that 

 he attributes the early and uniform death of the larva? to his own 

 negligence ; but the fact remains that in none of his observations 

 did an isolated female bring her offspring to maturity. Other en- 

 tomologists, especially Forel and Ebrard, have repeated the same 

 observations with similar results ; and as yet in no single case has 

 an isolated female been known to bring her young to maturity. 

 Forel even thought himself justified in concluding from his ob- 

 servations, and those of Ebrard, that such a fact could not occur. 



Lepeletier de St. Fargeau 1 was of opinon that ants' nests 

 originate in the second mode indicated above, and it is indeed far 

 from improbable that this may occur. No clear case has, however, 

 yet been observed. 



Hist. Nat. ties Ins. Hymenopteres, vi., p. 14-3. 



