PERFECT SOCIETIES OF INSECTS. 



41 



of Ants is likewise extremely valuable, not only as giving a 

 systematic arrangement and descriptions of the species, but 

 as concentrating the accounts of preceding authors, and adding 

 several interesting facts ex proprio penu. The great his- 

 toriographer of ants, however, is M. P. Huber, who has lately 



which it will appear that he was one of their best, or rather their very best his- 

 torian, till M. Ruber's work came out. His Account of English Ants was pub- 

 lished in 1747, long before either Linne or De Geer had written upon the sub- 

 ject. 



T. Species. He describes five species of English ants; viz. 1. The hill ant 

 (Formica rufa L.). 2. The jet ant (F. fuliginosa Latr. ). 3. The red ant 

 (Myrmica rubra Latr., Formica Lin.). He observes, that this species alone is 

 armed with a sting ; whereas the others make a wound with their mandibles, 

 and inject the formic acid into it. 4. The common yellow ant (F.flava Latr.). 

 And 5. The small black ant (F.fu&ca L.). 



IT. Egg. He observes that the eggs producing males and females are laid the 

 earliest, and are the largest : — he seems, however, to have confounded the black 

 and brown eggs of Aphides with those of ants. 



III. Larva. These, when first hatched, he observes, are hairy, and continue 

 in the larva state twelve months or more. He, as well as De Geer, was aware 

 that the larvae of Myrmica rubra do not, as other ants do, spin a cocoon when 

 they assume the pupa. 



IV. Pupa. He found that female ants continue in this state about six weeks, 

 and males and neuters only a month. 



V. Imago. He knew perfectly the sexes, and was aware that females cast 

 their wings previously to their becoming mothers ; that at the time of their 

 swarms large numbers of both sexes become the prey of birds and fishes ; that 

 the surviving females, sometimes in numbers, go under ground, particularly in 

 mole hills, and lay eggs : but he had not discovered that they then act the part 

 of neuters in the care of their progeny. He knew also, that when there was 

 more than one queen in a nest, the rivals lived in perfect harmony. 



With respect to the neuters, he had witnessed the homage they pay their 

 queens or fertile females continued even after their death ; — this homage he, 

 however, observes, which is noticed by no other author, appears often to be tem- 

 porary and local — ceasing at certain times, and being renewed upon a change of 

 residence. He enlarges upon their exemplary care of the eggs, larvae, and pupa?. 

 He tells us that the eggs, as soon as laid, are taken by the neuters and deposited 

 in heaps, and that the neuters brood them. He particularly notices their car- 

 rying them, with the larvae and pupae, daily from the interior to the surface of the 

 nest and back again, according to the temperature ; and that they feed the larvae 

 by disgorging the food from their own stomach. He speaks also of their opening 

 the cocoons when the pupae are ready to assume the imago, and disengaging them 

 from them. With regard to their labours, he found that they work all night, 

 except during violent rains ; that their instinct varies as to the station of their 

 nest ; that their masonry is consolidated by no cement, but consists merely of 

 mould ; that they form roads and trackways to and from their nests ; that 

 they carry each other in sport, and sometimes lie heaped one on another in the 

 sun. He suspects that they occasionally emigrate : — he proves by a variety of 

 experiments that they do not hoard up provisions. He found they were often 

 infested by a particular kind of Gordius : — he had noticed, also, that the neuters 

 of F. rufa and flava (which escaped M. Huber, though he observed it in Poly- 

 ergus rufescens Latr.) are of two sizes, which the writer of this note can confirm 

 by producing specimens ; — and, lastly, with Swammerdam, he had recourse to 

 artificial colonies, the better to enable him to examine their proceedings, but not 

 comparable to the ingenious apparatus of M. Huber. 



