_Early Stages._--The larvae of ants (fig. 3, e) are legless and helpless maggots with very small heads (fig. 3, f), into whose mouths the requisite food has to be forced by the assiduous "nurse" workers. The maggots are tended by these nurses with the greatest care, and carried to those parts of the nest most favourable for their health and growth. When fully grown, the maggot spins an oval silken cocoon within which it pupates (fig. 3, g). These cocoons, which may often be seen carried between the mandibles of the workers, are the "ants' eggs" prized as food for fish and pheasants. The workers of a Ceylonese ant (_Oecophylla smaragdina_) are stated by D. Sharp to hold the maggots between their mandibles and induce them to spin together the leaves of trees from which they form their shelters, as the adult ants have no silk-producing organs.
_Origin of Societies._--Ant-colonies are founded either by a single female or by several in association. The foundress of the nest lays eggs and at first feeds and rears the larvae, the earliest of which develop into workers. C. Janet observed that in a nest of _Lasius alienus_, established by a single female, the first workers emerged from their cocoons on the 102nd day. These workers then take on themselves the labour of the colony, some collecting food, which they transfer to their comrades within the nest whose duty is to tend and feed the larvae. The foundress-queen is now waited on by the workers, who supply her with food and spare her all cares of work, so that henceforth she may devote her whole energies to egg-laying. The population of the colony increases fast, and a well-grown nest contains several "queens" and males, besides a large number of workers. One of the most interesting features of ant-societies is the dimorphism or polymorphism that may often be seen among the workers, the same species being represented by two or more forms. Thus the British "wood ant" (_Formica rufa_) has a smaller and a larger race of workers ("minor" and "major" forms), while in _Ponera_ we find a blind race of workers and another race provided with eyes, and in _Atta_, _Eciton_ and other genera, four or five forms of workers are produced, the largest of which, with huge heads and elongate trenchant mandibles, are known as the "soldier" caste. The development of such diversely-formed insects as the offspring of the unmodified females which show none of their peculiarities raises many points of difficulty for students in heredity. It is thought that the differences are, in part at least, due to differences in the nature of the food supplied to larvae, which are apparently all alike. But the ovaries of worker ants are in some cases sufficiently developed for the production of eggs, which may give rise parthenogenetically to male, queen or worker offspring.