POSSIBLE MIGRATIONS OF THE ANTS. 
267 
equality seems perfect. If there were any difference, we should say 
that the class of the little ants, who build up the city and train up the 
people, is the more important, the life, genius, and soul of the state; 
the one which of itself could, at need, constitute the republic. 
j 
M. Huber has discovered two species (the red-brown and red) who 
do not possess this essential class, this fundamental element of the ant 
communities. It would not surprise us if the accessory or warrior class 
were wanting. But here, in reality, it is the basis which we find de¬ 
ficient,—the vital foundation,—the raison d'etre. We are, therefore, 
not so much astonished at the depraved resource by which these red 
ants subsist, as at the monstrous lacuna which compels them to 
adopt it. 
There is a mystery in the matter which we cannot at present ex¬ 
plain, but which would probably be cleared up if we could arrive at a 
knowledge of the general history of the species, its changes, and migra¬ 
tions. Who does not know the modification effected in animals, both 
externally and internally, in their forms and their manners, by the dis¬ 
placements they undergo ? Who, for example, would recognize the 
brother of our bull-dog—of the St. Bernard—of the giant dog of Persia, 
which could strangle lions—in that abortion, the Havannah dog, so 
weak and frail, that even in a torrid climate Nature has clothed it with 
a thick fleece, which conceals it, and converts it into an enigma ? 
The animal, when transplanted, may become a monster. 
The ants also may have had their revolutions, their moral and 
physical changes, in proportion as the globe, everywhere becoming in¬ 
habitable, has favoured their migrations. Several species, in the beauti¬ 
ful American climates, have preserved the honey-making industry; our 
own are ignorant of it, and are compelled to have recourse to the grubs; 
thence arises an art and a progress,—the art of breeding, preserving, 
and pasturing cattle. 
Some species may have advanced, others retrograded. And it is 
thus I should explain the kidnapping habits of the red ants. Probably 
they belong to expatriated and demoralized classes—fragments of de¬ 
cayed communities which have lost their arts,—and which could not 
live but for this barbarous and desperate method of slavery. They 
