ANTS AND ANT LIFE. 125 



ants, but only ventures into their nests dui-ing the winter* 

 when they are half frozen. In summer it would soon be 

 torn to pieces. As a rule, it lies in wait near the roads 

 frequented by ants and seizes solitary passers-by, tearing 

 open and devouring the abdomen filled with sweet juice. 

 Forel regards all Myrmecophila of which Taschenberg 

 reckons three hundred species in Germany alone as direct or 

 indirect parasites, and as only accidental parts of the economy 

 of the ant polity. He has found a large number of them, espe- 

 cially of species of beetles, in the ants' nests, but could not 

 establish their exact relations with the ants. That these beetles 

 are not always friends of the ants is proved by the following. 

 Forel saw a tolerably large beetle (Hister quadrimaculatus 

 JL.) appear in the midst of a number of F.pratensis, returning 

 from a battle with the red ants, and plunge his head into, 

 a pupa. The ants rushed furiously upon him, covered him 

 with bites and poison, and tried to tear away his prey. But 

 the hard outer case of the beetle made all their efforts 

 useless, and the beetle appeared to be perfectly conscious of 

 this and to be sure of his work, so did not let himself be 

 terrified. He kept his head and forefeet firmly fixed to the 

 pupa, and used his remaining four legs for retreat, and so 

 came off uninjured with his prey. Another species of Hister, 

 which tried a similar attack on P. ccespitium (turf ants), was 

 seen by Forel to expire under their stings. 



In addition to the beetles, Forel found in considerable 

 numbers in the ants' nests a large, long, white, ringed larva, 

 which was fed and tended by the ants like their own larvae,, 

 and which he regards as the larva of an \mknowu beetle, 

 which becomes a pupa and emerges elsewhere. Perhaps the- 

 ants confound this larva with their own, but some deeper 

 fact may lie in it. 



Moggridge very often found in the nests of the harvesting 

 ants together with little white spring tails, or Poduri, the 

 " silver fish " (Lepisma), and a small species of wood louse 

 (Coluocera attce) the larvae of an elater-beetle, of which the 

 ants appear to take great care. Moggridge thinks that this 

 care is quite selfish, and that it is shown in order to make 

 use of the tunnels of the larvae. A little cricket (Grillus 

 mynnecophilous) is also found in some ants' nests in Italy 

 and France. 



Still less is known of the Myrmecophila of non-European 



