certainly considerable differences between the different species, and one may almost fancy that we can trace stages corresponding to the principal steps in the history of human development.

I do not now refer to slave-making ants, which represent an abnormal, or perhaps only a temporary state of things, for slavery seems to tend in ants as in men to the degradation of those by whom it is adopted, and it is not impossible that the slave-making species will eventually find themselves unable to compete with those which are more self-dependent, and have reached a higher phase of civilisation. But putting these slave-making ants on one side, we find in the different species of ants different conditions of life, curiously answering to the earlier stages of human progress. For instance, some species, such as Formica fusca, live principally on the produce of the chase for though they feed partly on the honey-dew of aphides, they have not domesticated these insects. These ants probably retain the habits once common to all ants. They resemble the lower races of men, who subsist mainly by hunting. Like them they frequent woods and wilds, live in comparatively small communities, and the instincts of collective action are but little developed among them. They hunt singly, and their battles are single combats, like those of the Homeric heroes. Such species as Lasius flavus represent a distinctly higher type of social life; they show more skill in architecture, may literally be said to have

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92 HUNTING, PASTORAL, AND AGRICULTURAL ANTS.

domesticated certain species of aphides, and may be compared to the pastoral stage of human progress-to the races which live on the produce of their flocks and herds. Their communities are more numerous; they act much more in concert; their battles are not mere single combats, but they know how to act in combinȧtion. I am disposed to hazard the conjecture that they will gradually exterminate the mere hunting species, just as savages disappear before more advanced races. Lastly, the agricultural nations may be compared with the harvesting ants.

Thus there seem to be three principal types, offering a curious analogy to the three great phases-the hunting, pastoral, and agricultural stages-in the history of human development.

CHAPTER V.

BEHAVIOUR TO RELATIONS.

MR. GROTE, in his 'Fragments on Ethical Subjects,' regards it as an evident necessity that no society can exist without the sentiment of morality. Everyone,' he says, 'who has either spoken or written on the subject, has agreed in considering this sentiment as absolutely indispensable to the very existence of society. Without the diffusion of a certain measure of this feeling throughout all the members of the social union, the caprices, the desires, and the passions of each separate individual would render the maintenance of any established communion impossible. Positive morality, under some form or other, has existed in every society of which the world has ever had experience.'

If this be so, the question naturally arises whether ants also are moral and accountable beings. They have their desires, their passions, even their caprices. The young are absolutely helpless. Their communities are sometimes so numerous, that perhaps London and Pekin are almost the only human cities which can compare with them. Moreover, their nests are no mere

collections of independent individuals, nor even temporary associations like the flocks of migratory birds; but organised communities labouring with the utmost harmony for the common good. The remarkable analogies which, in so many ways, they present to our human societies, render them peculiarly interesting to us, and one cannot but long to know more of their character, how the world appears to them, and to what extent they are conscious and reasonable beings.

For my own part I cannot make use of Mr. Grote's argument, because I have elsewhere attempted to show that, even as regards man, the case is not by any means clear. But however this may be, various observers have recorded in the case of ants instances of attachment and affection.

Forel lays it down as a general rule that if ants are slightly injured, or rather unwell, their companions take care of them: on the other hand, if they are badly wounded or seriously ill, they are carried away from the nest, and left to perish.

Latreille, also, makes the following statement:'Le sens de l'odorat,' he says, 1 'se manifestant d'une manière aussi sensible, je voulois profiter de cette remarque pour en découvrir le siége. On a soupçonné depuis longtemps qu'il résidoit dans les antennes. Je les arrachai à plusieurs fourmis fauves ouvrières, auprès du nid desquelles je me trouvois. Je vis aussitôt ces petits animaux que j'avois ainsi mutilés

Hist. Nat. des Fourmis, p. 41.

tomber dans un état d'ivresse ou une espèce de folie. Ils erroient çà et là, et ne reconnoissoient plus leur chemin. Ils m'occupoient; mais je n'étais pas le seul. Quelques autres fourmis s'approchèrent de ces pauvres affligées, portèrent leur langue sur leurs blessures, et y laissèrent tomber une goutte de liqueur. Cet acte de sensibilité se renouvela plusieurs fois; je l'observois avec une loupe. Animaux compatissans! quelle leçon ne donnez-vous pas aux hommes.'

'Jamais,' says M. de Saint Fargeau,'une Fourmi n'en rencontre une de son espèce blessée, sans l'enlever et la transporter à la fourmilière. L'y soigne-t-elle ? Je ne sais, mais je vois dans ce fait une bienveillance que je ne retrouve dans aucun autre insecte, même social.'

I have not felt disposed to repeat M. Latreille's experiment, and M. de St. Fargeau's statement is I think by no means correct; indeed, many of my experiences seem to show not only a difference of character in the different species of ants, but that even within the limits of the same species there are individual differences between ants, just as between men.

I will commence with the less favourable aspect. On one occasion (August 13) a worker of Lasius niger, belonging to one of my nests, had got severely wounded, but not so much so that she could not feed; for though she had lost five of her tarsi, finding herself sear some syrup, she crept to it and began to feed. I

Hist. Nat. des Ins. Hymenoptères, vol. i. p. 99.