heart was torn out. But they are scarcely less unfortunate in their high
fortune. Imagine youths brought up in the knowledge that they are destined
to become royal bridegrooms for a single night,-- that after their bridal
they will have no moral right to live,-- that marriage, for each and all of
them, will signify certain death,-- and that they cannot even hope to be
lamented by their young widows, who will survive them for a time of many
generations...!



V


But all the foregoing is no more than a proem to the real "Romance of the
Insect-World."


-- By far the most startling discovery in relation to this astonishing
civilization is that of the suppression of sex. In certain advanced forms
of ant-life sex totally disappears in the majority of individuals;-- in
nearly all the higher ant-societies sex-life appears to exist only to the
extent absolutely needed for the continuance of the species. But the
biological fact in itself is much less startling than the ethical
suggestion which it offers;-- for this practical suppression, or
regulation, of sex-faculty appears to be voluntary! Voluntary, at least, so
far as the species is concerned. It is now believed that they wonderful
creatures have learned how to develop, or to arrest the development, of sex
in their young,-- by some particular mode of nutrition. They have succeeded
in placing under perfect control what is commonly supposed to be the most
powerful and unmanageable of instincts. And this rigid restraint of