TERMITES
sibly a world record in ovulation. The royal chamber is usually placed near the fungus gardens, and as fast as the eggs are delivered by the queen the attendant workers carry them off to the garden and distribute them over the fungus beds, where the young on hatching can feed and grow without further attention.
From a study of the termites we may draw a few lessons for ourselves. In the first place, we see that the social form of life is only one of the ways of living; but that, wherever it is adopted, it involves an interdependence of individuals upon one another. The social or community way of living is best promoted by a division of labor among groups of individuals, allowing each to specialize and thereby to attain proficiency in his particular kind of work. The means by which the termites have achieved the benefits of social life are not the same as those adopted by the ants or social bees, and they have little in common with the principles of our own social organization. All of which goes to show that in the social world, as in the physical world, the end alone justifies the means, so far as nature is concerned. Justice to the individual is a human concept; we strive to equalize the benefits and hardships of the social form of life, and in so far as we achieve this aim our civilization differs from that of the insects.
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