( XXXI ) 



lying about, and saw the mosquito next floating in the alcohol 

 between those Catochrysops pupae. These I had accidentally 

 put into the same tube a day or two later, and the observation 

 must have been made about that time." 



Dec. 19, 1917.—" I had to go to Agege to pay the labour 

 there; on Friday, Dec. 14, the day before I left for there, I 

 thought I'd like to go down to the famous Cremastogaster- 

 Hemtsonia-Argiolaus tree (I forgot Iridopsis) just to have 

 another look at the mosquitoes, to make sure that they really 

 were there. I captured two, easily enough, in little "lass 

 tubes, one with its precise ant and the other not. The precise 

 ant, finding itself imprisoned and annoyed, attacked the 

 unfortunate mosquito and killed it. (In a confined space they 

 will kill the softer Lycaenid larvae.) Hence I had to forego 

 the precise ant in the case of the other. On the tree I could 

 make out what looked like white banding on the mosquito, 

 and went home to look more leisurely at my find. Landed 

 there, I got a bad attack of what is known as ' cold feet.' 

 I knew little or nothing about mosquitoes, but had vague 

 recollections of a picture in a wonderful official compilation 

 known as the l West African Pocket Book,' that of a Stegomyia, 

 described in the accompanying letterpress as exhibiting the 

 pattern of a football jersey. (No wonder the unfortunate animal 

 is a victim of yellow fever !). But somehow the proboscis 

 of my myrmecophile didn't seem to fit into the scheme of 

 things. Its proboscis wouldn't, anyhow. 77 produced the 

 local ' chill, 5 for I couldn't recall any mosquito like it. I 

 began to wonder if it could really be a mosquito after all, 

 but its ' poise ' when alive, with its hind legs en Fair, and 

 everything else appeared to be unimpeachable. None the 

 less I decided that I couldn't wait till I heard from England, 

 so I decided to take it down to my friend Mrs. Connal at Yabe 

 when I went to Agege. This I did. I sent it down a day 

 ahead of myself with solemn injunctions not to treat the 

 matter with levity, it being no common mosquito, being in 

 fact a myrmecophile. When I reached Yabe I found that 

 there is next to nothing new under the sun ! I'm quite sure 

 now that what I'll get back from Lamborn will be a callous 

 recommendation to go to his old office binary cupboard, find 



