No. i.] A STUDY OF SOME TEXAN PONERINAE. 9 



of P. Jiarpax (including ergatoid females) be thrown together 

 into the same jar, the ants of different nests at once begin to 

 struggle with one another. One ant will grasp a stranger by 

 the head with her mandibles and smite her with rapidly vibrating 

 antennae ; or the two foes will interlock mandibles and pull in 

 opposite directions till one gives up and runs away, only to 

 begin the same performance with some other stranger. This 

 peculiar tugging goes on between the ants of different nests 

 for hours, or even for three or four days. Then, without any 

 mutilations or deaths as a result of the struggle, the ants 

 abandon all this hostile play, and thenceforth form a single 

 peaceable community. 



When two nests of workers of L. elongata are put together, 

 the struggle which ensues presents a slightly different aspect. 

 An ant from one nest will grasp a stranger by an antenna or 

 by one of her fore feet and, while tugging, smite her opponent 

 with very rapidly vibrating antennae. In this species there is 

 no interlocking of mandibles. After several days of tugging 

 and struggling the same peaceable conditions supervene as in 

 the case of P. harpax. 



Workers of O. haematodes, belonging to different nests, 

 never display the slightest animosity towards each other, so far 

 as I have been able to observe : in a strange nest they are 

 treated exactly as if they had always belonged there. An 

 exception to this conduct of O. haematodes in the case of 

 friends deprived of their antennae will be mentioned below. 



A few observations were made on the conduct of nests of 

 workers towards sexual individuals from other nests. One of 

 the two males of P. Jiarpax, taken March 3, was placed in a 

 strange nest of ten workers (including ergatoid females). The 

 male, after walking about on the earth for a short time, found 

 his way into one of the galleries in which six of the wingless 

 individuals were digging. On perceiving the male they at once 

 stopped their work and began licking the winged stranger with 

 signs of great agitation and affection. At the same time they 

 carefully massaged all his limbs and segments with their 

 mandibles. During this effusion the attitude of the male was 

 most peculiar. He lay on his back in what may be described 



