492 ants' nests. 



an original sketcli by Mr. Wrougliton (fig. 8). We refer tlie reader to 

 tlie drawing and to the explanation of the plates. 



The large nest constructed in the foliage of trees, between the leaves? 

 by (Ecophylla smaragdina Fabr., one of the most common ants of trop- 

 ical Asia and tropical Africa, forms, however, the prototype of spun 

 ants' nests. A great number of leaves are fastened together by a fine, 

 white web, like the finest silk stuff. This web, apart from the color, 

 has exactly the same appearance, both to tlie naked eye and under the 

 microscope, as that of Polyrhachis sjnnigerd. The leaves are usually 

 fastened together by the edges. The nest is large, and the large, long- 

 very vicious, reddish to greenish worker ants live in it, with their 

 grass-green females, their black males, and their whole brood. They 

 form very i)opulous colonies in the branches of the trees. Fig. 10 repre- 

 sents a portion of the nest of (EcophyUa smaragdina, with the web and 

 the borders of the leaves which are fastened together. 



Now, how do the ants spin? This has, unfortunately, so far as I 

 know, never yet been observed sufficiently closely. Not even the way 

 in which the pasteboard of our European ants is made has been discov- 

 ered. Las'tus fuliginosus has never consented to work before my eyes. 

 At all events, the spinning of Q^lcophyUa, which works in broad day- 

 light, ought to be the first to be seen, and, in fact, the only minute 

 observations on this subject known to me, by E. H. Aitken, in the Jour- 

 nal of the Bombay Natural History Society, 1890, Vol. V, No. 4, i>age 

 422 ("Red ants' nests"), now lie before nie. 



Aitken saw how (EcopliyUa fastened two leaves together. A worker 

 went to the base of the two leaves, at the point at which they began to 

 separate, i)laced his hind legs, wliich are furnished with sharp claws, 

 npon one of the leaves and diew the other leaf toward him with all his 

 might with his upper jaw. If the distance was too great, from two to 

 five ants chained themselves together for this task, each grasi)ing the 

 body of one of the others, the first holding one leaf with his mandibles, 

 the last seizing the other leaf with the claws of the tarsi. While the 

 edges of the two leaves were held as close together as possible, simply 

 by these chains of ants working side by side, with the application of all 

 their strength in the utmost tension, as if by india-rubber bauds, Aitken 

 saw other ants zealously engaged in binding the edges of the two leaves 

 together with strong silk threads or ropes, which they si)un closer and 

 closer together the nearer the leaves approached each other. When a 

 sufficient number of leaves had been fastened together in this way by 

 their edges, the whole was rendered Avaterproof by a com]>act silk web, 

 and was divided into chambers and passages by a similar web, Aitken 

 is a reliable and accurate observer. This highly interesting observa- 

 tion of his is entitled to full credit. Only one thing is wanting to it, to 

 wit, the information from what i)art of the body of the ant the silk 

 thread issues. This must likewise be observed. 



