Severe as this constant and unremitted daily labour seems, it is but a small part of what the affection of the working ants leads them readily to undertake. The feeding of the young brood, which rests solely upon them, is a more serious charge. The nest is constantly stored with larvæ the year round, during all which time, except in winter when the whole society is torpid, they require feeding several times a day with a viscid half-digested fluid that the workers disgorge into their mouths, which when hungry they stretch out to meet those of their nurses. Add to which, that in an old nest there are generally two distinct broods of different ages requiring separate attention; and that the observations of Huber make it probable that at one period they require a more substantial food than at another. It is true that the youngest brood at first want but little nutriment: but still, when we consider that they must not be neglected, that the older brood demand incessant supplies, and in a well stocked nest amount to 7 or 8000; and that the task of satisfying all these cravings, as well as providing for their own subsistence, falls to the lot of the working ants, we are almost ready to regard the burthen as greater than can be borne by such minute agents; and we shall not wonder at the incessant activity with which we see them foraging on every side.
Their labour does not end here. It is necessary that the larvæ should be kept extremely clean; and for this purpose the ants are perpetually passing their tongue and mandibles over their body, rendering them by this means perfectly white[690]. After the young grubs have attained their full growth, they surround themselves with a silken cocoon and become pupæ, which, food excepted, require as much attention as in the larva state. Every morning they are transported from the bottom of the nest to the surface, and every evening returned to their former quarters. And if, as is often the case, the nest be thrown into ruins by the unlucky foot of a passing animal, in addition to all these daily and hourly avocations, is superadded the immediate necessity of collecting the pupæ from the earth with which they have been mixed, and of restoring the nest to its pristine state[691].
Nothing can be more curious than the view of the interior of a fully peopled ants' nest in summer. In one part are stored the eggs; in another the pupæ are heaped up by hundreds in spacious apartments; and in a third we see the larvæ surrounded by the workers, some of which feed them, while others keep guard, standing erect upon their hind legs with their abdomen elevated in the position for ejaculating their acid, than which, gunpowder would not be more formidable to the majority of their foes. Some again are occupied in cleaning the alleys from obstructions of various kinds; and others rest in perfect repose recruiting their strength for new labours.
Contrary to what is observed amongst other insects, even the extrication of the young ants from the silken cocoon which incloses them is imposed upon the workers, who are taught by some sensation to us incomprehensible, that the perfect insect is now ready to burst from the shroud, but too weak to effect its purpose unaided. When the workers discover that this period has arrived, a great bustle prevails in their apartment. Three or four mount upon one cocoon, and with their mandibles begin to open it where the head lies. First they pull off a few threads to render the place thinner; they then make several small openings, and with great patience cut the threads which separate them one by one, till an orifice is formed sufficiently large for extracting the prisoner; which operation they perform with the utmost gentleness. The ant is still enveloped in its pellicle; this the workers also pull off, carefully disengaging every member from its case, and nicely expanding the wings of such as are furnished with them. After thus liberating and afterwards feeding the new-born insects, they still for several days watch and follow them every where, teaching them to unravel the paths and winding labyrinths of the common habitation[692]; and when the males and females at length take flight, these affectionate stepmothers accompany them, mounting with them to the summit of the highest herbs, showing the most tender solicitude for them, (some even endeavour to retain them,) feeding them for the last time, caressing them; and at length, when they rise into the air and disappear, seeming to linger for some seconds over the footsteps of these favoured beings, of whom they have taken such exemplary care, and whom they will never behold again[693].
In the above account, exclusive of the bare fact of their laying the eggs, no mention is made of the female ants, the real parents of the republic. You are not from this to suppose that they never feel the influence of this divine principle of love for their offspring. When, indeed, a colony is established and peopled, they have enough to do to furnish it with eggs to produce its necessary supply of future females, males and workers; which, according to Gould, are laid at three different seasons[694]. This is the ordinary duty assigned to them by Providence. Yet at the first formation of a nest, the female acts the kind part, and performs all the maternal offices which I have just described as peculiar to the workers; and it is only when these become sufficiently numerous to relieve her, that she resigns this charge and devotes herself exclusively to oviposition[695].
There is one circumstance occurring at this period of their history, which affords a very affecting example of the self-denial and self-devotion of these admirable creatures. If you have paid any attention to what is going forward in an ant-hill, you will have observed some larger than the rest, which at first sight appear, as well as the workers, to have no wings, but which upon a closer examination exhibit a small portion of their base, or the sockets in which they were inserted. These are females that have cast their wings, not accidentally but by a voluntary act. When an ant of this sex first emerges from the pupa, she is adorned with two pair of wings, the upper or outer pair being larger than her body. With these, when a virgin, she is enabled to traverse the fields of ether, surrounded by myriads of the other sex, who are candidates for her favour. But when once connubial rites are celebrated the unhappy husband dies, and the widowed bride seeks only how she may provide for their mutual offspring. Panting no more to join the choir of aërial dancers, her only thought is to construct a subterranean abode in which she may deposit and attend to her eggs, and cherish her embryo young, till, having passed through their various changes, they arrive at their perfect state, and she can devolve upon them a portion of her maternal cares. Her ample wings, which before were her chief ornament and the instruments of her pleasure, are now an incumbrance which incommode her in the fulfilment of the great duty uppermost in her mind; she therefore, without a moment's hesitation, plucks them from her shoulders. Might we not then address females who have families, in words like those of Solomon, "Go to the ant, ye mothers, consider her ways and be wise"?
M. P. Huber was more than once witness to this proceeding. He saw one female stretch her wings with a strong effort so as to bring them before her head—she then crossed them in all directions—next she reversed them alternately on each side—at last, in consequence of some violent contortions, the four wings fell at the same moment in his presence. Another, in addition to these motions, used her legs to assist in the work[696].
Thus, from the very moment of the extrusion of the egg to the maturity of the perfect insect, are the ants unremittingly occupied in the care of the young of the society, and that with an ardour of affectionate attachment to which, when its intensity and duration are taken into the account, we may fairly say there is nothing parallel in the whole animal world[697]. Amongst birds and quadrupeds we have instances of affection as strong perhaps while it lasts, but how much shorter the period during which it is exerted! In a month or two the young of the former require no further attention; and if in a state of nature some of the latter give suck to their offspring for a longer period, it is on their parts without effort or labour; and in both cases the time given up to their young forms a very small part of the life of the animal. But the little insects in question not only spend a greater portion of time in the education of their progeny, but devote even the whole of their existence, from their birth to their death, to this one occupation!
The common hive-bee and the wasp in their attention to their young exhibit the same general features. Both build for their reception hexagonal cells, differing in size according to the future sex of the included grubs, which as soon as hatched they both feed and assiduously tend until their transformation into pupæ. There are peculiarities, however, in their modes of procedure, which require a distinct notice.
The economy of a nest of wasps differs from that of bees, in that the eggs are laid not by a single mother or queen, but by several; and that these mothers take the same care as the workers in feeding the young grubs: indeed those first hatched are fed entirely by the female which produced them, the solitary founder of the colony. The sole survivor probably of a last year's swarm of many thousands, this female, as soon as revived by the warmth of spring, proceeds to construct a few cells, and deposits in them the eggs of working wasps. The eggs are covered with a gluten, which fixes them so strongly against the sides of the cells, that it is not easy to separate them unbroken. These eggs seem to require care from the time they are laid, for the wasps many times in a day put their heads into the cells which contain them. When they are hatched, it is amusing to witness the activity with which the female runs from cell to cell, putting her head into those in which the grubs are very young, while those that are more advanced in age thrust their heads out of their cells, and by little movements seem to be asking for their food. As soon as they receive their portion, they draw them back and remain quiet. These she feeds until they become pupæ; and within twelve hours after being excluded in their perfect state, they eagerly set to work in constructing fresh cells, and in lightening the burthen of their parent by assisting her in feeding the grubs of other workers and females which are by this time born. In a few weeks the society will have received an accession of several hundred workers and many females, which without distinction apply themselves to provide food for the growing grubs, now become exceedingly numerous. With this object in view, as they collect little or no honey from flowers, they are constantly engaged in predatory expeditions. One party will attack a hive of bees, a grocer's sugar hogshead, or other saccharine repository; or, if these fail, the juice of a ripe peach or pear. You will be less indignant than formerly, at these audacious robbers now you know that self is little considered in their attacks, and that your ravaged fruit has supplied an exquisite banquet to the most tender grubs of the nest, into whose extended mouths the successful marauders, running with astonishing agility from one cell to another, disgorge successively a small portion of their booty in the same way that a bird supplies her young[698]. Another party is charged with providing more substantial aliment for the grubs of maturer growth. These wage war upon bees, flies, and even the meat of a butcher's stall, and joyfully return to the nest laden with the well-filled bodies of the former, or pieces of the latter as large as they can carry. This solid food they distribute in like manner to the larger grubs, which may be seen eagerly protruding their heads out of the cells to receive the welcome meal. As wasps lay up no store of food, these exertions are the task of every day during the summer, fresh broods of grubs constantly succeeding to those which have become pupæ or perfect insects; and in autumn, when the colony is augmented to 20 or 30,000, and the grubs in proportion, the scene of bustle which it presents may be readily conceived.