have to turn attention briefly on their modes of life. The industry of the ant is proverbial, and can not fail to arrest the attention of any one who spends a few minutes before an ant-hill. But carefully recorded observations prove it to be much greater than could have been imagined. Sir John Lubbock has rendered special service here by carefully noting the time occupied, as well as the amount of work done, thus preserving a series of observations exceedingly suggestive in many ways, and having an important bearing on a considerable number of difficult questions connected with the relative powers of lower and higher orders of life. A similar service has been rendered in America in the work of the Rev. H. C. McCook of Philadelphia, on The Natural History of the Agricultural Ant of Texas, -a book recording careful and most important observations, adding much to the stores of knowledge concerning ants.*

The work of the ants is directed mainly to the two great objects of animal life, procuring food, and caring for the young, to which falls to be added, the repelling of attacks upon their nests, or removal of any thing obnoxious. They destroy great numbers of smaller *See Appendix X.

insects, bearing them to their nests for consumption, besides going off in search of honey which may be within reach, and not guarded with spikes. This mode of providing implies a very busy life, and they do not as a rule grudge work. Besides procuring supplies, however, there is a large amount of labor in the care bestowed upon their young. Without attempting to distinguish various orders, of which more than seven hundred kinds

are known,"* a general description of their young will suffice. In the earliest stage of their existence, the larvæ are small conical shaped grubs, without power of movement. In this state they are fed, carried about from place to place as if their seniors were seeking change of air and temperature for them; and in process of these removals and arrangements, they are often grouped together in separate companies, and in exact order according to their size. In their next stage, they become pupæ, sometimes quite exposed, in other cases covered with a thin silken covering. From this, they pass into the mature state as perfect insects, and in process of this transition older ants render assistance by way of aiding the transition, "carefully

* See Appendix VIII.

unfolding their legs and smoothing out their wings."

In the ant nest there is a singular distinction of orders which prevents us speaking of the parent ants as doing all this work for the young. The great majority in every nest are neuters, not producing young; these are the workers, and they are destitute of wings. The smaller numbers only are the males and females producing the young. The workers, shorn of wings, and entrusted with all that is required in household and out-door duties, labor assiduously. These neuter ants have occasioned special perplexity to Mr. Darwin as bearing on the theory of evolution, a difficulty which is seriously increased by the fact that in some cases they "differ from each other, sometimes to an almost incredible degree, and are thus divided into two or even three castes," and these "do not commonly graduate into each other," but are "as distinct from each other as any two species.' Without following Mr. Darwin through his reasoning as to the adaptation of neuters for their task in life, it may be well to quote his words towards its close, where he says, "I * Origin of Species, 6th ed. p. 230.

11

must confess, that, with all my faith in natural selection, I should never have anticipated that this principle could have been efficient in so high a degree, had not the case of these neuter insects led me to this conclusion."* Besides the fact that these neuters are the workers, there is an additional circumstance, established by Mr. Frederick Smith by observations in England, confirmed by the observations of Pierre Huber in Switzerland, and afterwards verified in the clearest way by Mr. Darwin, that there is a species of ant (formica sanguinea) which captures slaves of a weaker order, making war against the weaker race, carrying off their young, rearing them within their own nests, and training them to serve. Mr. Darwin was himself sceptical of such a statement, but gives an interesting narrative of distinct observations by which it was confirmed.

The amount of labor undertaken by the workers from an ants' nest, may be judged by one or two extracts from the records of Sir John Lubbock. He says, "I once watched an ant from six in the morning, and she worked without intermission till a quarter Origin of Species, 6th ed. p. 233.

to ten at night," and in that time she had carried one hundred and eighty-seven larvæ into the nest.* There is evidence not only of coöperation, but of division of labor among the workers. The observations of Mr. Forel lead to the conclusion that "very young ants devote themselves at first to the care of the larvæ and pupæ, and that they do not take share in the defence of the nest or other outof-door work, until they are some days old."+ By a distinct set of observations, watching all ants that came and went from the nest, and laying up in captivity some of the number, Mr. Lubbock came to the conclusion "that certain ants are told off as foragers."‡ And in the winter season, when in the case of some orders little food is required, a few only of the inhabitants of the nest come and go, for the purpose of carrying in supplies. This makes observation much more easy at that season, rendering it possible to number and identify individual workers. The results as applicable to one of the nests are given in the following sentences. "From the 1st of November to the 5th of January, with two or three casual exceptions, the whole of the supplies were car† Ib. p. 78. ‡ lb. p. 135.

* Scient. Lects. p. 73.