the sake of the children. Nothing less
than an earthquake, an eruption, an inundation, or a desperate war, is
allowed to interrupt the daily routine of dusting, sweeping, scrubbing,
and disinfecting.

IV

Now for stranger facts:--

This world of incessant toil is a more than Vestal world. It is true
that males can sometimes be perceived in it; but they appear only at
particular seasons, and they have nothing whatever to do with the
workers or with the work. None of them would presume to address a
worker,--except, perhaps, under extraordinary circumstances of common
peril. And no worker would think of talking to a male;--for males, in
this queer world, are inferior beings, equally incapable of fighting or
working, and tolerated only as necessary evils. One special class of
females,--the Mothers-Elect of the race,--do condescend to consort with
males, during a very brief period, at particular seasons. But the
Mothers-Elect do not work; and they most accept husbands. A worker
could not even dream of keeping company with a male,--not merely
because such association would signify the most frivolous waste of
time, nor yet because the worker necessarily regards all males with
unspeakable contempt; but because the worker is incapable of wedlock.
Some workers, indeed, are capable of parthenogenesis, and give birth to
children who never had fathers. As a general rule, however, the worker
is truly feminine by her moral instincts only: she has all the
tenderness, the patience, and the foresight that we call "maternal;"
but her sex has disappeared, like the sex of the Dragon-Maiden in the
Buddhist legend.

For defense against creatures of prey, or enemies of the state, the
workers are provided with weapons; and they are furthermore protected
by a large military force. The warriors are so much bigger than the
workers (in some communities, at least) that it is difficult, at first
sight, to believe them of the same race. Soldiers one hundred times
larger than the workers whom they guard are not uncommon. But all these
soldiers are Amazons,--or, more correctly speaking, semi-females. They
can work sturdily; but being built for fighting and for heavy pulling
chiefly, their usefulness is restricted to those directions in which
force, rather than skill, is required.

[Why females, rather than males, should have been evolutionally
specialized into soldiery and laborers may not be nearly so simple a
question as it appears. I am v