39 2 ANTS. 



tapering abdomen and very smooth surface, so that it cannot be readily 

 seized by its host. Janet says that "these guests keep circulating and 

 gliding about among the ants [Lasiits ini.vtus], but never remain stand- 

 ing in their neighborhood. I have sometimes seen the ants threaten 

 the Lepisinina and even spring upon them, but the latter are so agile 

 that they always escape. Nevertheless, in my artificial nests, where 

 they have greater difficulty in concealing themselves than in the natural 

 nests, the}- are eventually captured. Two days after installing them in 

 the nest. I found five cadavers which the ants were holding in their 

 mandibles and carrying about the nest." The Atclura will eat honey 

 from the manger of the nest, but they seem, as a rule, to obtain their 

 food by running up and imbibing some of the liquid regurgitated by 

 one ant to another. After furnishing the nest with honey Janet made 

 the following observations : " From the instant that the first foragers 



FIG. 232. Atclura coming up to snatch the droplet of food that is being regurgitated 

 by one Lasius mi.rtus worker to another. (Janet.) 



returned to the inhabited chamber of the nest, the Lcpismina showed 

 by their excitement, that they perceived the odor of honey. Soon a 

 considerable number of ants were grouped in couples for the purpose 

 of regurgitating. They elevated their bodies slightly and often raised 

 their fore legs, thus leaving a vacant space under their heads. As soon 

 as a Lcpisinina came near such a couple, it thrust itself into the space, 

 raised its head, suddenly snapped up the droplet that was passing in 

 front of it and made off at once as if to escape merited pursuit [Fig. 

 232]. I'.ut the ants standing face to face are not free enough in their 

 movements even to threaten the audacious thief, who forthwith pro- 

 ceeds to take- toll from another couple, and continues these tactics until 

 his appetite is appeased." The habits of the golden yellow Atclura 

 wheel eri, which occurs in the nest of many ants in Texas and northern 

 Mexico, are probably very similar to those of fonnicaria. Escherich 

 (19030, 1905), who has recently monographed the Lepismidre, records 

 a number of species of Lepisiua, Braunsina, Lcpisinina and Atelura as 



