96 TApril, 1909. 



time I did not know what ^<peeies this ant was, never havin<^ seen 

 umh'atus before, but the wide head distinguished it from either flavus 

 or nif/er, and it was, in fact, very unlike a ni^er ? . 



This $ I put in a glass-topped pill-box with a niqer worker from 

 a nest outside. She immediately killed the worker. A worker from 

 my nest of niger (this nest I will call No. 1), was treated in a similar 

 way some days later. On the morning of August 24th 1 introduced 

 several strange niqer workers. To my surprise, no hostility was shown 

 either by them or the % I again put her alone with another ant from 

 my nest. This time the two were quite friendly. Three other workers 

 also were friendly. I then, the same day at 12.12 p.m., removed the 

 lid of the box. and put it on its side by the door of nest No. I. By 

 12.14 all the workers had left the ? and entered the nest. The ? 

 then slowly moved towards the door of the nest, and entered of her 

 own accord. An ant met and attacked her inside the door, and then 

 ran back into the nest. In a few seconds the whole nest was in a 

 turmoil, and swarms of ants collected round the ? , saluting and 

 caressing her as they do their own queen. One ant alone seized her 

 by a leg, and kept hold some time. At 12.17 she was in the middle of 

 the nest, in a chamber formerly occupied by the old queen, surrounded 

 by workers 1 noticed a worker offer her food. At 12.40 she was 

 completely hidden by a mass of ants. 



This extraordinary occurrence surprised me very much, as I knew 

 how infallibly ants recognise strangers. It is quite incredible to an}'- 

 one knowing the habits of ants, to suppose they mistook the $ for a 

 niger. A few days later the ants killed the single winged «?yer $ that 

 had hatched in the nest. A few days after I introduced a second $ 

 umhratus into the nest. There was intense excitement among the ants, 

 but they eventually killed her.. No eggs were laid by the queen in 

 1896 (in m}'' experience the ? $ of umhratus do not lay till the next 

 year after impregnation), and the nicjer larvje left by the old queen 

 lived through the winter, and began to change into pupae in the 

 beginning of June, 1897. 



On June 26th the umhratus queen began to lay, and by August 1st 

 there was a large quantity of eggs laid by her. The larvae from these 

 eggs lived through the winter. 



On May Slat, 1898, the first larva in the nest changed into a 

 pupa, and by the end of July there were about 100 pupae in the nest. 



On August 2nd twenty pupae hatched, the young ants all being 

 niger. It is clear that there is an error in my records here, for it is 

 hardly possible that the larvae from niger eggs laid in 1896 could have 



