FORMICA

(Lat. an ant.) A Limuean genus of insects, now the type of a very numerous and extensively distributed family (Formicidce), belonging to the order Hymenoptera, and to that section which is negatively characterized by not. being armed with a sting, and by not po e ing any instrument for piercing the bodies of animals, or the substance of plants, for the purpose of oviposition. The procreative economy of these well-known and most Interesting insects is that to which ail their wonderful habits and peculiarities are e entially related; and among those genera which the wisdom of Providence has ordained should form a ociations for the purpose of multiplying, preserving, and providing for their kind, the ants stand in a prominent and interesting rank, whether viewed as presenting some of the higher traits of animal instinct, or as a living evidence of an all-wise Intelligence, whose mute but incontrovertible orders are thus so implicitly and cheerfully obeyed. In every species of insect the parents are relieved from >he charge of providing for their offspring: they neither attend to their wants, nor defend them from harm in their immature and helple state; and this, not from any deficiency of natural attachment, but from the brief period of their existence after having attained the state of maturity [s. 482]