[1] See also Markwick in White's Nat. Hist. ii. 256.[2] The Excursion.[3] The females (ScarabÆus argenteus, Marsh.) have red legs, and the males (ScarabÆus pulverulentus, Marsh.) black.[4] Kirby in Linn. Trans. v. 256.[5] The authors of this work were the witnesses of the magnificent scene here described. It was on the second of September. The first was on the ninth of that month.[6] De Geer, vi. 338.[7] Naturforsch. xvii. 226.[8] Nat. Hist. ii. 101.[9] Vol. I. 265—[10] Fn. Germ. Init. xlix. 18.[11] Philos. Trans. lxxiii. 217.[12] Naturforsch. vi. 110.[13] ii. 135.[14] Naturforsch. vi. 111.[15] Ibid. xi. 95.[16] Ibid. 94.[17] Travels, i. 13.[18] R. Milit. Chron. for March 1815, p. 452.[19] Vol. I. 197.[20] See Vol. I. 215.[21] Pallas, ii. 422-6.[22] Travels, 187.[23] Bochart, Hierozoic. ii. l. 4. c. 2. 460.[24] In Philos. Trans. for 1698.[25] Jackson's Marocco, 51.[26] Bochart, Hierozoic. ubi supra.[27] Proverbs xxx. 27.[28] Joel ii. 8.[29] Catesby's Carolina, ii. 111. See above, Vol. I. 51.[30] Vol. I. 473. Reaumur, ii. 125.[31] De Geer, ii. 1029.[32] Bonnet, ii. 57.[33] Vol. I. 475.[34] Reaumur, ii. 180.[35] It is not here meant to be asserted that insects are actuated by these passions in the same way that man is, but only that in their various instincts they exhibit the semblance of them, and as it were symbolize them.[36] Plusieurs d'entre eux (Insectes) savent user de ressources ingÉnieuses dans les circonstances difficiles: ils sortent alors de leur routine accoutumÉe et semblent agir d'aprÈs la position dans laquelle ils se trouvent; c'est lÀ sans doute l'un des phÉnomÈnes les plus curieux de l'histoire naturelle. Huber, Nouvelles Observations sur les Abeilles, ii. 198.—Compare also ibid. 250, note N. B.[37] I employ occasionally the term neuters, though it is not perfectly proper, for the sake of convenience;—strictly speaking, they may rather be regarded as imperfect or sterile females. Yet certainly, as the imperfection of their organization unfits them for sexual purposes, the term neuter is not absolutely improper.[38] Œuv. ix. 163.[39] M. P. Huber in Linn. Trans. vi. 256. Reaum. v.[40] Vol. I. 244.[41] The neuters in all respects bear a stronger analogy to the larvÆ than to the perfect insects; and, after all, may possibly turn out to be larvÆ, perhaps of the males. Huber seems to doubt their being neuters. Nouv. Obs. ii. 444, note *.[42] In this these animals vary from the usual instinct of the social Hymenoptera, the ants, the wasps, and the humble-bees—with whom the females lay the first foundations of the colonies, unassisted by any neuters;—but in the swarms of the hive-bee an election may perhaps in some instances be said to take place.[43] Vol. I. Ed. 508.[44] See Vol. I. 509.[45] Gould's Account of English Ants, 22.[46] The late John Hunter dissected two young queens. In the abdomen he found two ovaries, consisting of many hundred oviducts, each containing innumerable eggs.[47] The anonymous author before alluded to, who observed the Ceylon white ants, says, that such was the size of the masses, which were tempered with a strong gluten, that they adhered though laid on the upper part of the breach.[48] Latr. Hist. Nat. xiii. 64.[49] N. Dict. D'Hist. Nat. xxii. 57, 58.[50] Bochart, Hierozoic. ii. 1. iv. c. 22.[51] M. P. Huber, in the account which, in imitation of De Geer, he has given of the discoveries made by his predecessors in the history of ants, having passed without notice, probably ignorant of the existence of such a writer, those of our intelligent countryman Gould, I shall here give a short analysis of them; from which it will appear, that he was one of their best, or rather their very best historian, till M. Huber's work came out. His Account of English Ants was published in 1747, long before either LinnÉ or De Geer had written upon the subject.

I. 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. fusca, L.).

II. 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 larvÆ 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 previous 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 temporary and local—ceasing at certain times, and being renewed upon a change of residence. He enlarges upon their exemplary care of the eggs, larvÆ, and pupÆ. 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 carrying them, with the larvÆ and pupÆ, daily from the interior to the surface of the nest and back again, according to the temperature; and that they feed the larvÆ by disgorging the food from their own stomach. He speaks also of their opening the cocoons when the pupÆ 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 Polyergus 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.[52] Gould says that the males and females are nearly equal in number, p. 62; but from Huber's observations it seems to follow that the former are most numerous, p. 96.[53] That the neuter ants, like those of the hive-bee, are imperfectly organized females, appears from the following observation of M. Huber (Nouv. Observ. &c. ii. 443.)—"Les fourmis nous ont encore offert À cet Égard une analogie trÈs frappante; À la vÉritÉ, nous n'avons jamais vu pondre les ouvriÈres, mais nous avons ÉtÉ tÉmoins de leur accouplement. Ce fait pourroit Être attestÉ par plusieurs membres de la SociÉtÉ d'Histoire Naturelle de GÉnÈve, À qui nous l'avons fait voir; l'approche du mÂle Étoit toujours suivie de la mort de l'ouvriÈre; leur conformation ne permet donc pas qu'elles deviennent mÈres, mais l'instinct du mÂle prouve du moins que ce sont des femelles."[54] Gould, 103.[55] M. Huber calls this an apterous female; yet he could not discover that they laid eggs; and he owns that they more nearly resembled the workers than the females; and that he should have considered them as such, had he seen them mix with them in their excursions. Huber, p. 251.[56] De Geer ii. 1104.[57] Gould, 99.[58] Huber, 105.[59] Pilgrimage, 1090.[60] M. Huber observes that fecundated females, after they have lost their wings, make themselves a subterranean cell, some singly, others in common. From which it appears that some colonies have more than one female, from their first establishment.[61] ii. 1071.[62] Gould, p. 24—.[63] Compare Gould p. 25, with Huber 125, note (1).[64] It may be thought that many of the anecdotes related in the following history of the proceedings of neuter ants could not have been observed by any one, unless he had been admitted into an ant-hill; but it must be recollected that M. P. Huber, from whose work the most extraordinary facts are copied, invented a kind of ant hive; so constructed as to enable him to observe their proceedings without disturbing them.[65] Vol. I. 476.[66] Gould, 92. De Geer ii. 1067. Huber, 5, 132.[67] Huber, 133.[68] Huber, 237, 217, 167.[69] Ibid. 137.[70] Bradley, 134.[71] Gould, 85.[72] Hist. of Barbadoes, p. 63.[73] Vol. I. p. 122.[74] See Fourcroy, Annales du MusÉum, no. 5. p. 338, 342. Some, however, still regard it as a distinct acid.[75] p. 34.[76] See Fourcroy, Annales du MusÉum, no. 5. 343.[77] Gould, 101.[78] One would think the writer of the account of ants in Mouffet had been witness to something similar. "If they see any one idle," says he, "they not only drive him as spurious, without food, from the nest; but likewise, a circle of all ranks being assembled, cut off his head before the gates, that he may be a warning to their children not to give themselves up for the future to idleness and effeminacy."—Theatr. Ins. 241.[79] Mouffet, Theatr. Ins. 242.[80] Huber, 160.[81] See Huber, chap. v.[82] Huber, 287. Jurine, HymÉnoptÈres, 273.[83] It is not clear that our Willughby had not some knowledge of this extraordinary fact; for in his description of ants, speaking of their care of their pupÆ, he says, "that they also carry the aureliÆ 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 this to devour them, or educate them? White made the same observation, Nat. Hist. ii. 278.[84] 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.[85] Since the publication of the first edition of this volume I have met with fresh confirmation of the extraordinary history here related. Having been induced to visit Paris, and calling upon M. Latreille (so justly celebrated as one of the first entomologists of the age, and to whom I feel infinitely indebted for the friendly attentions which he paid to me during my too short stay in that metropolis), he assured me, that he had verified all the principal facts advanced by Huber. He has also said the same in his ConsidÉrations nouvelles et gÉnÉrales sur les insectes vivant en SociÉtÉ. (MÉm. du Mus. iii. 407.) At the same time he informed me that there was a nest of the rufescent ants in the Bois de Boulogne, to which place he afterwards was so good as to accompany me. We went on the 25th of June, 1817. The day was excessively hot and sultry. A little before five in the afternoon we began our search. At first we could not discern a single ant in motion. In a minute or two, however, my friend directed my attention to one individual—two or three more next appeared—and soon a numerous army was to be seen winding through the long grass of a low ridge in which was their formicary. Just at the entrance of the wood from Paris, on the right-hand and near the road, is a bare place paled in for the Sunday amusement of the lower orders—to this the ants directed their march, and upon entering it divided into two columns, which traversed it rapidly and with great apparent eagerness; all the while exploring the ground with their antennÆ as beagles with their noses, evidently as if in pursuit of game. Those in the van, as Huber also observed, kept perpetually falling back into the main body. When they had passed this inclosure, they appeared for some time to be at a loss, making no progress but only coursing about: but after a few minutes delay, as if they had received some intelligence, they resumed their march and soon arrived at a negro nest, which they entered by one or two apertures. We could not observe that any negroes were expecting their attack outside the nest, but in a short time a few came out at another opening, and seemed to be making their escape. Perhaps some conflict might have taken place within the nest, in the interval between the appearance of these negroes and the entry of their assailants. However this might be, in a few minutes one of the latter made its appearance with a pupa in its mouth; it was followed by three or four more; and soon the whole army began to emerge as fast as it could, almost every individual carrying its burthen. Most that I observed seemed to have pupÆ. I then traced the expedition back to the spot from which I first saw them set out, which according to my steps was about 156 feet from the negro formicary. The whole business was transacted in little more than an hour. Though I could trace the ants back to a certain spot in the ridge before mentioned, where they first appeared in the long grass, I did not succeed in finding the entrance to their nest, so that I was deprived of the pleasure of seeing the mixed society. As we dined at an auberge close to the spot, I proposed renewing my researches after dinner; but a violent tempest of thunder and rain, though I attempted it, prevented my succeeding; and afterwards I had no opportunity of revisiting the place.

M. Latreille very justly observes that it is physically impossible for the rufescent ants (Polyergus rufescens), on account of the form of their jaws and the accessory parts of the mouth, either to prepare habitations for their family, to procure food, or to feed them.—ConsidÉrations nouvelles, &c. p. 408.[86] Vol. I. 370.[87] See Huber, chap, vii-xi.[88] The ant ascends the tree, says LinnÉ, that it may milk its cows, the Aphides, not kill them. Syst. Nat. 962. 3.[89] Huber, 195. I have more than once found these Aphides in the nests of this species of ant.[90] See Huber, chap. vi. I have found Aphides in the nest of Myrmica rubra. Boisier de Sauvages speaks of ants keeping their own Aphides, and gives an interesting account of them. Journ. de Physique, i. 195.[91] Gould, 42.[92] Walking one day early in July in a spot where I used to notice a single nest of Formica rufa, I observed that a new colony had been formed of considerable magnitude; and between it and the original nest were six or seven smaller settlements.[93] See Huber, chap. iv. § 3.[94] Gould, 67. De Geer, ii. 1054.[95] Hist. Animal. l. ix. c. 38.[96] Gould, 68.[97] Huber, 35, 42.[98] Ibid. 23.[99] Plin. Hist. Nat. lxi. c. 29.[100] Gould, 87.[101] De Geer, ii. 1067.[102] Huber, 146.[103] Œuv. de Bonnet, i. 535. Huber, 197.[104] Vol. I. 258.[105] Voy. to Maurit. 71.[106] I was much amused, when dining in the forest of Fontainebleau, by the pertinacity with which the hill-ant (F. rufa) attacked our food, haling from our very plates, while we were eating, long strips of meat many times their own size.[107] Related in the Quarterly Review for August 1816, p. 259.[108] Insect. Surinam. p. 18. In her plate the ants are represented so connected.[109] Voyages dans l'AmÉrique MÉrid. i. 187.[110] Gould, 69.[111] Huber, 73.[112] Gould, 103—.[113] Bonnet, ii. 407.[114] Huber, 170—.[115] Huber, Nouv. Observ. ii. 443.[116] Vol. I. p. 501.[117] For 1807, 242—.[118] Ibid. 243.[119] Bombus. Apis * *. e. 2. K.[120] MÉmoires du MusÉum, &c. i. 55.[121] P. Huber, in Linn. Trans. vi. 264.—This author says however in another place (ibid. 285), that the male eggs are laid in the spring, at the same time with those that are to produce workers. Perhaps by the former he means the male offspring of the small females, and by the latter those of the large?[122] Hub. Nouv. Observ. ii. 375.[123] Ibid. 373—.[124] This account of the proceedings of humble-bees is chiefly taken from Reaumur, vi. MÉm. l.; and M. P. Huber in Linn. Trans. vi. 214—.[125] Apis **. e. l. K. Dr. Bevan has lately published a very interesting work on the Honey Bee, which the reader will do well to consult.[126] Vol. I. 481.[127] Judges xiv. 8, 9.[128] See Aristot. Hist. Animal. l. v. c. 22. Virgil. Georgic. l. iv.; and Mouffet, 12—.[129] Aristot. ubi supr. c. 21. De Generat. Animal. l. iii. c. 10, where there is some curious reasoning upon this subject.[130] Bonnet, x. 199— 236—.[131] Hist. Animal. l. v. c. 22.[132] De Generat. Animal. l. iii. c. 10.[133] Œuvr. x. 194—.[134] Bonnet, x. P. Huber in Linn. Trans. vi. 283. Reaumur (v. 373) observes that some queens are much larger than others; but he attributes this difference of their size to the state of the eggs in their body.[135] As every reader is not aware of the differences of form, &c. that distinguish the females, males, and workers from each other (I have seen the male mistaken for a distinct species, and placed in a cabinet as Apis lagopoda, L.), I shall here subjoin a description of each.—

i. The body of the Female bee is considerably longer than that of either the drone or the worker. The prevailing colour in all three is the same, black or black-brown; but with respect to the female this does not appear to be invariably the case; for—not to insist upon Virgil's royal bees glittering with ruddy or golden spots and scales, where allowance must be made for poetic licence—Reaumur affirms, after describing some differences of colour in different individuals of this sex, that a queen may always be distinguished, both from the workers and males, by the colour of her body[136]. If this observation be restricted to the colour of some parts of her body, it is correct; but it will not apply to all generally (unless, as I suspect may be the case, by the term body he means the abdomen), for, in all that I have had an opportunity of examining, the prevailing colour, as I have stated it, is the same.

The head is not larger than that of the workers; but the tongue is shorter and more slender, with straighter maxillÆ. The mandibles are forficate, and do not jut out like theirs into a prominent angle; they are of the colour of pitch with a red tinge, and terminate in two teeth, the exterior being acute, and the interior blunt or truncated. The labrum or upper-lip is fulvous; and the antennÆ are piceous.

In the trunk, the tegulÆ or scales that defend the base of the wings are rufo-piceous. The wings reach only to the tip of the third abdominal segment. The tarsi and the apex of the tibiÆ are rufo-fulvous. The posterior tibiÆ are plane above and covered with short adpressed hairs, having neither the corbicula (or marginal fringe of hairs for carrying the masses of pollen) nor the pecten; and the posterior plantÆ have neither the brush formed of hairs set in striÆ, nor the auricle at the base.

The abdomen is considerably longer than the head and trunk taken together, receding from the trunk, elongato-conical, and rather sharp at the anus. The dorsal segments are fulvous at the tip; covered with very short, pallid, and, in certain lights, shining adpressed hairs; the first segment being very short, and covered with longer hairs. The ventral segments, except the anal, which is black, are fulvescent or rufo-fulvous, and covered with soft longer hairs. The vagina of the spicula (commonly called the sting) is curved.

ii. The Male bee, or drone, is quite the reverse of his royal paramour; his body being thick, short, and clumsy, and very obtuse at each extremity[137]. It is covered also, as to the head and trunk, with dense hairs.

The head is depressed and orbicular. The tongue is shorter and more slender than that of the female; and the mandibles, though nearly of the same shape, are smaller. The eyes are very large, meeting at the back part of the head. In the space between them are placed the antennÆ and stemmata. The former consist of fourteen joints, including the radicle, the fourth and fifth being very short and not easily distinguished.

The trunk is large. The wings are longer than the body. The legs are short and slender. The posterior tibiÆ are long, club-shaped, and covered with inconspicuous hairs. The posterior plantÆ are furnished underneath with thick-set scopulÆ, which they use to brush their bodies.

The claw-joints are fulvescent.

The abdomen is cordate, very short, being scarcely so long as the head and trunk together, consisting of seven segments, which are fulvous at their apex. The first segment is longer than any of the succeeding ones, and covered above with rather long hairs. The second and third dorsal segments are apparently naked; but under a triple lens, in a certain light, some adpressed hairs may be perceived;—the remaining ones are hairy, the three last being inflexed. The ventral segments are very narrow, hairy, and fulvous.

iii. The body of the Workers is oblong.

The head triangular. The mandibles are prominent, so as to terminate the head in an angle, toothless and forcipate. The tongue and maxillÆ are long and incurved: the labrum and antennÆ black.

In the trunk the tegulÆ are black. The wings extend only to the apex of the fourth segment of the abdomen. The legs are all black, with the digits only rather piceous. The posterior tibiÆ are naked above, exteriorly longitudinally concave, and interiorly longitudinally convex; furnished with lateral and recumbent hairs to form the corbicula, and armed at the end with the pecten. The upper surface of the posterior plantÆ resembles that of the tibiÆ; underneath they are furnished with a scopula or brush of stiff hairs set in rows: at the base they are armed with stiff bristles, and exteriorly with an acute appendage or auricle.

The abdomen is a little longer than the head and trunk together; oblong, and rather heart-shaped—a transverse section of it is triangular. It is covered with longish flavo-pallid hairs: the first segment is short with longer hairs; the base of the three intermediate segments is covered, and as it were banded, with pale hairs. The apex of the three intermediate ventral segments is rather fulvescent, and their base is distinguished on each side by a trapeziform wax-pocket covered by a thin membrane. The sting, or rather vagina of the spicula, is straight.[136] Reaumur, v. 375.[137] Virgil seems to have regarded the drone as one of the sorts of kings or leaders of the bees, when he says, speaking of the latter,