74 THE ENTOMOLOGIST § RECORD. 
The mimicry of ouests associating with blind or nearly blind ants 
takes quite a different form, as it only seeks to deceive the sense of 
touch. It begins with a similarity of structure and hair-growths be- 
tween guest and ant, and develops into a close similarity of form in 
the different parts of the body, more particularly in the antenne. The 
best examples are to be seen in the Heciton guests of Brazil. The 
notorious *‘ wander-ants,”’ the terror of all small animals, belonging to 
the neo-tropical regions, have in their suite a number of different 
guests, especially beetles belonging to the Staphylinidae, who accom- 
pany these robber-bands, either on foot or riding on the egg-clusters. 
In 1891 I had already described twenty-one species of HMciton guests, 
and since then several very remarkable species have been sent to me. 
Mimicry plays the principal part in assisting these guests to live in 
such dangerous society. Not only do they receive no harm, but they 
are even allowed to help themselves to the prey and offspring of their 
thievish hosts. Hight of these twenty-one species of Hciton guests 
mimic their hosts. It can be proved that these are cases of true 
mimicry (i.e., to deceive their hosts) by comparing them with the 
mimicry of guests of clear-sighted ants. The former deceive the host’s 
sense of touch in the same way that the latter deceive the host’s sense 
of sight. citon mimicry reaches its highest state of perfection in 
Ficitomorphe simulans, Wasm., a guest of Heiton foreli, Mayr, and in 
Mimeciton pulex, Wasm. (pl., fig. 4), a guest of Eciton praedator, Sm. 
A superficial glance would not suffice to understand this kind of 
mimicry, as the similarity i is not calculated to deceive the sight but the © 
touch. It is necessary to place each part of the mimic’s body under 
the lens, and compare it with a similar part of the body of the smallest 
worker-anis of the host. One will then recognise a true /ctton mimic, 
whereas, to the naked eye, by the side of the glossy-black ant it looks 
like a long-legged ruby-red flea—hence its name ‘‘pulex.” The 
mimicry here exhibited is so perfect that by closer observation one 
would think one had a real ant before one instead of a beetle. Its 
head is shaped like a small Mciton head, its thorax stretches out and is 
narrowly arched like the back of an Heiton and contracted exactly in 
the same place as the ant’s thorax, and on both there is a large 
fissure. ‘Then there comes an apparently unconquerable obstacle. 
How is the very broad knotty-shaped first segment of the double- 
ringed hind-beody of the ant to he represented by a beetle that should 
possess elytra in this identical spot? The elytra of the MJimeciton are 
no longer elytra because they do not cover any wings, nor have they a 
suture. They form a knotty shaped roof, from under which the 
narrowed base of the abdomen proceeds in the same manner as the 
second part of the abdomen of the Heiton. The abdomen is fat and 
arched hike that of a well-fed ant, and‘the antenne are whip-shaped 
and have a long first joint identical with those of the ant. To make 
the mimicry perfect the beetle has even lost its compound eyes, which 
are replaced by tiny ocelli like those of the ant. It has the long spider- 
legs of the wander-ant, but this also serves it for a practical purpose, 
i.e., to keep up when running in company with these capricious 
vagabonds. What is even still more astonishing is the fact that the 
comb- shaped spur on the extremity of the ant’s anterior tibie is repro- 
duced in the beetle by a spur-shaped hook (see pl., fig. 4). If there 
are anywhere in nature examples of true mimicry, they are to be found 
