1906.] Wheeler, Habits of the Tent-building Ant. 9 



activities of the aphides and coccids at least during the night hours. 

 Under such circumstances a paper or earthen tent would be of great 

 service not only to the aphides or coccids, but also to the ants them- 

 selves, since the latter feel bound to spend so much of their time in 

 the company of their charges. This time, of course, is not misspent, 

 since it is obviously of advantage to the ants to be on hand to prevent 

 any waste of the honey dew. 



The tents of C. lineolata may seem to some to be admirable ex- 

 amples of foresight and reason on the part of their little builders. 

 But although I have just shown how useful these structures may be, 

 I am unable to maintain or even to believe that the ants are aware 

 of these purposes. Like all ant structures, the tents undoubtedly 

 exhibit a considerable degree of variability both in form and texture, 

 but it is clear, nevertheless, that they are built on a common plan even 

 in widely separated regions, so that instead of explaining them as the 

 results of rational activity in the face of new conditions, there may 

 be considerable justification in regarding them as due to an hereditary 

 instinctive disposition, present in all the colonies of the species, but 

 manifesting itself only under conditions formerly prevalent or uni- 

 versal but now of rare and sporadic occurrence. In order to obtain 

 light on this matter, it will be necessary to inquire into the related 

 instincts not only of other species of Creinastogaster but also of other 

 genera of ants. In such inquiries the comparative method is of very 

 great value. No instinct is known to be restricted to a single species, 

 and in no two species is an instinct ever manifested in exactly the 

 same way. Hence careful comparison of similar instincts in different 

 species is apt to throw light on the phylogeny of animal behavior and 

 often points the way to profitable observation and experimentation. 

 Let us adopt this method in our study of the tent-building instincts 

 of C. lineolata. 



The tent-building instincts are not peculiar to the ant under dis- 

 cussion. In his incomparable work 1 published nearly a century ago, 

 Pierre Huber gives the following account of the tents constructed by 

 the "brown ant" (Lasius niger): 



" One day I happened on a spurge plant that bore in the middle 

 of its stem a little sphere of which the stem was the axis. This was 

 a habitation that the ants had built of earth. They left it through 

 a tiny opening made in its base, descended along the stem and passed 

 into a neighboring formicary. I demolished a portion of this pa- 

 vilion, built almost in the air, for the purpose of studying its interior. 



' Recherches sur les Moeurs des Fourmis Indigenes. Paris 1810, pp. 198-201. 



