PERFECT SOCIETIES OF INSECTS. 



63 



(Prof. Jurine), who was desirous of verifying their existence 

 by examining himself the two species united. " 1 



He afterwards appeals to nature, and calls upon all who 

 doubt it to repeat his experiments, which he is sure will soon 

 satisfy them, — a satisfaction which, as I have just observed, 

 in this country we cannot receive, for want of the slave- 

 making species. And now to begin my history. 



There are two species of ants which engage in these excur- 

 sions, Polyergus rufescens and Formica sanguinea ; but they 

 do not, like the African kings, make slaves of adults, their 

 sole object being to carry off the helpless infants of the colony 

 which they attack, the larvas and pupse ; these they educate 

 in their own nests till they arrive at their perfect state, when 

 they undertake all the business of the society. 2 In the fol- 

 lowing account I shall chiefly confine myself to what Huber 

 relates of the first of these species, and conclude my extracts 

 with his history of an expedition of the latter to procure 

 slaves. 



The rufescent ants 3 do not leave their nests to go upon 

 these expeditions, which last about ten weeks, till the males 

 are ready to emerge into the perfect state ; and it is very re- 

 markable, that if any individuals attempt to stray abroad 

 earlier, they are detained by their slaves, who will not suffer 

 them to proceed : — a wonderful provision of the Creator to 

 prevent the black colonies from being pillaged when they 

 contain only male and female brood, which would be their 

 total destruction, without being any benefit to their assailants, 

 to whom neuters alone are useful. 



Their time of sallying forth is from two in the afternoon 

 till five, but more generally a little before five : the weather, 



1 Huber, 287. Jurine, Hymenopt&res, 273. 



2 It is not clear that our Willughby had not some knowledge of this extra- 

 ordinary fact ; for in his description of ants, speaking of their care of their pupae, he 

 says, " that they also carry the aurelice of others into their nests, as if they were their 

 own." (Rai. Hist. Ins. 69.) Gould remarks concerning the hill-ant, " This species 

 is very rapacious after the vermicles and nymphs of other ants. If you place a 

 parcel before or near their colonies, they will, with remarkable greediness, seize 

 and carry them off." 91. note *. Query — Do they do this to devour them, or 

 educate them? White made the same observation (Nat. Hist. ii. 278.). 



3 This species forms a kind of link which connects Latreille's two genera 

 Formica and Myrmica, borrowing the abdominal squama from the former, and 

 the sting from the latter. 



