440 WILLIAM M. MANN 



The actual damage caused by these ants is said by Mr. J. D. 

 Mitchell, who has made many observations on the species, to 

 be greatly overestimated. 



Von Ihering (19) in Brazil found nests of the army ant, Eciton 

 coecum, deep in the earth beneath termite nests. It has long 

 been supposed that ants of the genus Eciton do not make per- 

 manent nests, but move about from place to place. At times 

 clusters have been found with many workers, larvae and pupae, 

 and often a female, and these have been considered temporary 

 nests. Von Ihering thinks that these are swarms. The female, 

 blind and wingless, is not capable of founding a colony unaided, 

 after the manner of most queen ants, and new colonies are 

 established by means of a "swarm," composed of a queen and 

 numerous woikers, often accompanied by males. Sometimes 

 males of different species are present, and von Ihering thinks 

 that hybridization may not be uncommon among the species 

 of Eciton. 



Jacobson (20) in Java observed the larvae of the butterfly, 

 Hypolycaena erylns, which is attended by the ant Oecophylla 

 smaraedina. Both of these insects were common on the rubi- 

 aceous plant Bangnersia spinosa. The butterfly lays her eggs 

 on a plant tenanted by the ants. These attend the larva, and 

 by caressing it receive a drop of exuded liquid which is eagerly 

 lapped up. A considerable amount of this liquid is secreted by 

 a single larva during the course of a day. Larvae under obser- 

 vation, not attended by ants, became listless and later died, so 

 there is evidently a close though not well understood, symbiotic 

 relation between the two insects. The pupae also were cared 

 for and licked, though in them there is no evident food supply 

 for the ants. 



Lea (2r) in a supplement to a paper on the Australian and 

 Tasmanian Coleoptera inhabiting or resorting to the nests of 

 ants, bees and termites (Proc. Roy. Soc. Victoria, Vol. XXIII, 

 (New Series, pt. r, rcjiG.)) lists and describes a large number of 

 myrmecophilous and termitophilous beetles. Through the ener- 

 gies of Mr. Lea and his co-workers the very rich ant-nest fauna 

 of Australia and Tasmania is becoming comparatively well 

 known. It is an interesting fact that the ponerine ants of those 

 islands, especially Ectatoma metallicum, harbor a preponderant 

 number of the inquilines. 



