26 O. E. PLATH. 



willing slaves. . . . Her first care is to ingratiate herself with the 

 inhabitants, and in this she succeeds so well that the workers soon 

 cease to show any hostility towards her. Even the queen grows 

 accustomed to the presence of the stranger, and her alarm disap- 

 pears, but it is succeeded by a kind of despondency. Her interest 

 and pleasure in the brood seem less, and so depressed is she that 

 one can fancy she has a presentiment of the fate that awaits her. 

 It is by no means a cheerful family, and the gloom of impending 

 disaster seems to hang over it." 



The hostile attitude of the Bremus workers toward the Psithyrus 

 which has killed their mother (in one case weeks before) is de- 

 scribed by Sladen ('12, pp. 256, 277) as follows: "It was clear 

 that the workers deposed the Psithyrus queen, and I think that this 

 was the culminating act in a revolt that the queen had all along 

 found it difficult to repress. ... It appears that when the 

 [Brcinus] colony is populous the [Psithyrus] rupestris [queen] 

 will lose her life unless she maintains constantly her rule of 

 repression." 



Though interesting, this account of the behavior of the Psithyrus 

 queen and the victimized Bremus colony toward each other is not 

 only opposed by the earlier work of Smith ('55, p. 210) and Hoffer 

 ('81, '88), but also by recent observations on the habits of some of 

 our American Psithyri. 



During the summer (June 24 to August 12) of 1921 the writer 

 located 14 Bremus colonies, 13 of which were placed in observation 

 boxes a day or two after they were discovered. They were then 

 transferred to the Bussey Institution, where they were kept under 

 observation for periods varying from one to four months. Each 

 box was provided with a glass cover and an opening which com- 

 municated with the outside world through holes in boards placed 

 below the screens of three of the windows (one on the second and 

 two on the third floor) of one of the Bussey buildings. Nearly all 

 of the colonies flourished, some producing hundreds of young 

 queens and males. On August 9, colony No. 13 (B. affinis) was 

 dug up after much effort, the tunnel being over seven feet in 

 length. The nest was about three feet below the surface and con- 

 tained the old queen and about 100 workers of Bremus affinis 

 Cresson, and the old queen, 3 young queens, and 6 males of 



