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to their hives, on Christmas eve, at twelve o'clock, in order to listen to their humming; which elicited, as they believed, a much more agreeable music, than at any other period; since, at that time, they celebrated, in the best manner they could, the morning of Christ's nativity.

What a beautiful picture is that, presented by Virgil, in the Corycian swain! I remember, says he, an old Corycian, who lived under the lofty turrets of Oebali1, on the banks of the Galesus. He cultivated a few acres of land, which, till they came into his possession, had been waste and neglected. The soil was too poor for the plough; not adapted to the keeping of flocks; nor was it well situated for the culture of vines. Yet, there, in a cottage, standing among bushes, he cultivated potherbs, lilies, vervain, and poppies. He was the first to pluck the rose in spring, and the first to gather fruits in autumn. In winter he employed the principal part of the day in attending to the shrubs and flowers, which were to furnish honey for his bees. In spring he fed them; in summer he watched their swarming; and in autumn gathered their honey. This was his sole employment, from year to year: and in this occupation, says Virgil, being contented and happy, he was essentially richer, than all the kings of the earth.

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Simonides, my dear Lelius, is well known to have written a satire upon women. In this celebrated poem he supposes, after the manner of Pythagoras, every woman to have had a pre-existent state; to have animated some body, or to have been composed out of some of the elements, which bear a similitude to the character, she sup

1 Tarentum.

ports in the present state of existence. This idea he carries on, in no very courteous terms, till he comes to the last species of women; the component parts of whom, he says, were made out of the bee. The qualities, by which this order was distinguished, were a faultless character and a blameless life. Orderly in her household; loving and beloved by her husband; she is the mother of a virtuous and beautiful family:

"And her whole course of living is a pattern,

For chaste and virtuous women;"

Massinger's Duke of Milan, Act iii. s. 1.

forming almost as fine a picture of an admirable woman, as Lucian's portrait of the wife of Verus. Would you know more of her qualities, my Lelius? Consult the fascinating Hortensia; who has, like a jewel, hung "twenty years upon thy neck, and never lost her lustre." And as it was the wish of the Romans, upon the accession of a new emperor, that he might be more fortunate than Augustus', and more admirable than Trajan, so, when Constance 2 has arrived at a marriageable age, may she possess the qualities of the bee; united to the grace and the beauty of her mother! "A thousand graces sit, already, under the shade of her eyelids 3.'

3 "

1 Felicior. Avgosto. Melior. Trajano-Eutrop. Brev. Hist. Rom. 1. viii. c. 5.-At Roman nuptials it was customary to wish the bridegroom as happy as Thalassius, who, in the reign of Romulus, having married a Sabine virgin, was esteemed the happiest of men. Vide Livy, i. c. 9.

2 O matre pulchrâ filia pulchrior.

> Anacreon:-from whom Spenser :

66

Upon her eyelids many graces sat,

Under the shadow of her even brows."

CHAPTER X.

WITH bees we may associate ants,—so variously treated of by Lewenhoek, Swammerdam, Linnæus, Geoffrey de Geer, Bonnet, Latreille, and Huber. Ants, like bees, are divided into males, females, and neuter; or rather females, who, being barren, from their sexual organs not being developed, are labourers for the benefit of the entire community. Like those of bees, the males and females of ants seem to have no other duties, than just to live and to procreate. The barren ones provide food; construct the habitations; nurture the young; and guard the citadels.

In building they exhibit much ingenuity; every one seeming "to follow his own fancy." Both the male and the female have wings; and when the heat has arisen to a certain height, they issue from their habitations, escorted by the labourers, who offer them food during the first stage of their emigration. Then the males and females take flight, during which the act of fecundation is frequently performing. When the females are impregnated, the males are left to themselves; and being unprovided with food, and incapable of procuring it, they soon die of want; while the females pursue their course to some little distance, and seek out habitations; where, finding themselves destitute of labourers, they begin to work, in order to procure food for themselves.

Those few females, which remain behind in the immediate neighbourhood, having been impregnated in their nests, are forcibly taken back by the labourers, who deprive them of their wings, feed them, and attend them till

they have deposited their eggs. Ants are totally unacquainted with the economy of hoarding.!! They are almost entirely carnivorous; living upon other insects, and portions of other animal substances; and on the nutritious juices of gall insects and kermes; also on exudations from several species of the aphis, which the labourers take home for the males and females, that do not work. This secretion of the aphis is supposed to be destined, not only for its own subsistence, but for that of ants: for the aphis is always in the neighbourhood of ant colonies; and they become torpid precisely at the same temperature. Some species of ants even collect the eggs of the aphis, and bestow upon them the same care, they do upon those of their own species. They also construct habitations for them, at a small distance from their own nests; where they go to them, and rob them of their secretions, whenever they are in want. These secretions the aphis yields with the same willingness and docility, that sheep and cows give down their milk.

Ants have parental and filial affections; friendly dispositions and social sympathies; and when any of the impregnated females die, they lick their bodies for several days, and pay them all manner of attention, as if they thought they could restore them to life. But to balance these moral perfections, they wage war not only against other insects, but small quadrupeds; and, like bees, against communities of their own species. Some species of ants even carry on war for the sake of making slaves of their enemies. These ants, whom Huber calls Amazons, live in nests; in which also reside an inferior species of ant, who do for them all the domestic services they require. At a certain season of the year these Amazons

quit their nests in great numbers, in search of those nests, which contain that species of ant, which they have left behind. When they find, a battle ensues. The Amazons almost always conquer; when they enter the nests of those they have subdued, rob them of all their eggs and larvæ, which they take to their own habitations, and breed up to maturity; when they become slaves, as it were, to the other ants, who never work; performing, as before observed, every species of domestic service; viz. that of building, nourishing the young ones, and providing food. In one important particular these slaves are singularly fortunate. They perform all their duties with the greatest willingness and activity; and love their masters, as if they were ants of their own species.

This description of the manners of ants, so curious in themselves, and so opposed to the generally received opinion 1, that, like bees, they hoard up for the winter, is founded on the patient researches of Mons. Huber2, of Geneva. In respect to the aphis, it is curious to remark, that though females are produced every season, males are produced only once in ten years. Both of them are found on stems, leaves, and roots of trees and plants; and the females are exceedingly prolific. When the males arrive at full maturity, they copulate with the females; which copulation, as Trembley suggested, many years since, has been found by Bonnet and Richard

1 Parvula magni formica laboris

3

Ore trahit quodcunque potest, atque addit acervo

Quem struit, haud ignara ac non incauta futuri.-Hor. Sat. i. 1. 33.

2 Vide Recherches sur les Mæurs des Fourmis indigènes, par P. Huber. Paris, 1810.

3 M. Bonnet received a vine-fretter at the time of its birth, and reared it alone. It produced young without having had any opportunity of connexion

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