A761.15    Beagle Library:     Cuvier, Georges. 1827-35. The animal kingdom arranged in conformity with its organization. With additional descriptions of all the species hitherto named, and of many not before noticed, by Edward Griffith and others. 16 vols. London: Geo. B. Whittaker. vol. 15: Insecta (2).   Text

terraneous passages, or covered galleries, when necessity obliges them, and proceed from them on their devastating excursions. Like the ants, they are omnivorous; like them, at a certain time of their life, they have four wings, and then emigrate and form colonies. The termites also resemble the ants in their laborious activity, but they surpass the bees, the wasps, and the beavers, in the art of building. Each community, according to Sparmann, is composed of one male, one female, and of

A761.17    Beagle Library:     Cuvier, Georges. 1827-35. The animal kingdom arranged in conformity with its organization. With additional descriptions of all the species hitherto named, and of many not before noticed, by Edward Griffith and others. 16 vols. London: Geo. B. Whittaker. vol. 17.   Text

Many other serpents, as well as this, are partial to ants. In France, the coluber austriaca is sometimes found in the ant-hills, where it goes for the purpose of feeding on these insects, and, not improbably, to conceal itself during the winter season. This amphisb na has from two hundred and twenty to two hundred and thirty and odd rings around the body, and from sixteen to eighteen around the tail. Its length is about a foot and a half, of which the tail scarcely forms the twelfth part. The

A761.06    Beagle Library:     Cuvier, Georges. 1827-35. The animal kingdom arranged in conformity with its organization. With additional descriptions of all the species hitherto named, and of many not before noticed, by Edward Griffith and others. 16 vols. London: Geo. B. Whittaker. vol. 6: Aves (1).   Text

observed them in the interior of the countries of Guiana in the lofty and sombre forests which cover the soil in this portion of Southern America. They live there generally speaking in small flocks and subsist chiefly on ants the quantity of which is prodigious in those hot and humid climates. There where man has been hitherto unable to exercise his destructive imprudence we may observe the admirable care with which nature has disposed all her works the harmony of their distribution the equilibrium

A761.11    Beagle Library:     Cuvier, Georges. 1827-35. The animal kingdom arranged in conformity with its organization. With additional descriptions of all the species hitherto named, and of many not before noticed, by Edward Griffith and others. 16 vols. London: Geo. B. Whittaker. vol. 11: Fossil remains.   Text

The fossil INSECTS, to which the name of entomolites has been given, are found either in amber or in fissile stones. The first are perfectly preserved in all their parts, and even the species may be recognised. In this substance flies have been found, tipul , ichneumons, ants, c. M. de France mentions a piece of amber, about the thickness of one's thumb, and somewhat flattish, in which twenty-eight insects were distinctly to be seen, such as ants, tipul , small coleoptera, and a curculio, not

A761.14    Beagle Library:     Cuvier, Georges. 1827-35. The animal kingdom arranged in conformity with its organization. With additional descriptions of all the species hitherto named, and of many not before noticed, by Edward Griffith and others. 16 vols. London: Geo. B. Whittaker. vol. 14: Insecta (1).   Text

and sometimes one of sufficient length. But when these animals are assembled in the same place in large bodies, when they form, like the termites and ants, innumerable legions, soon, in spite of their littleness, they will devour and cause to disappear all the organized bodies which they find deprived of life. The end of the Author of Nature in establishing such societies of insects, appears to have been to augment the energy of this active and re-active force, which maintains equilibrium

A761.15    Beagle Library:     Cuvier, Georges. 1827-35. The animal kingdom arranged in conformity with its organization. With additional descriptions of all the species hitherto named, and of many not before noticed, by Edward Griffith and others. 16 vols. London: Geo. B. Whittaker. vol. 15: Insecta (2).   Text

of the masonry to disappear. When at times it is too violent it may destroy chambers, the vault of which is not yet finished. But the ants very speedily raise them again: often a complete story is finished in the space of from seven to eight hours. M. Huber has, nevertheless, seen these insects destroy chambers that were not yet covered, and distribute the materials on the last story of the habitation, after a violent north wind, which, by drying up the masonry too quickly, diminished the

A761.15    Beagle Library:     Cuvier, Georges. 1827-35. The animal kingdom arranged in conformity with its organization. With additional descriptions of all the species hitherto named, and of many not before noticed, by Edward Griffith and others. 16 vols. London: Geo. B. Whittaker. vol. 15: Insecta (2).   Text

the hand of man, if M. de Prefontaine, who accompanied him, had not informed him, that in spite of its gigantic construction, it was the work of black ants of the largest species. He proposed to conduct him, not to the ant-hill, where both of them would infallibly have been devoured, but to the road of the workers. M. Malouet did not approach within more than forty paces of the habitation of these insects. It had the form of a pyramid truncated at one-third of its height, and he estimated that

A761.03    Beagle Library:     Cuvier, Georges. 1827-35. The animal kingdom arranged in conformity with its organization. With additional descriptions of all the species hitherto named, and of many not before noticed, by Edward Griffith and others. 16 vols. London: Geo. B. Whittaker. vol. 3: Mammalia (3)   Text

substance forms a buckler over the forehead; a second, very large and very convex, over the shoulders; a third, similar to the preceding, on the crupper, and between these two last, several parallel and moveable bands, which give the body the faculty of bending. The tail is sometimes furnished with successive rings, * Buchanan (Travels in the Mysore, t. ii. p. 198,) assures us, that it is a true Bear, which lives on white Ants, fruit of Sorgho, c. The Translator has inspected the skull of the

A761.03    Beagle Library:     Cuvier, Georges. 1827-35. The animal kingdom arranged in conformity with its organization. With additional descriptions of all the species hitherto named, and of many not before noticed, by Edward Griffith and others. 16 vols. London: Geo. B. Whittaker. vol. 3: Mammalia (3)   Text

eyes are very small. The Monotremes are found only in New Holland, where they have been discovered since the settlement of the English there. There are two genera known. The Echidnes, (Echidna, Cuv. TACHYGLOSSUS, Illig), otherwise Spiny Ant-eaters. Their elongated muzzle, terminated by a small mouth, contain a tongue extensible, like that of the Ant-eaters and Pangolins. They live, therefore, on Ants, in the manner of these two genera. They have no teeth, but their palate is furnished with

A761.06    Beagle Library:     Cuvier, Georges. 1827-35. The animal kingdom arranged in conformity with its organization. With additional descriptions of all the species hitherto named, and of many not before noticed, by Edward Griffith and others. 16 vols. London: Geo. B. Whittaker. vol. 6: Aves (1).   Text

on insects and principally ants. They are found in both continents. Still the species of the old continent are remarkable for the lively colours of their plumage. These are the [page] 40