174 ANTS AND ANT LIFE. 



sides are exhausted by protracted struggle. Forel observed 

 two neighboring nests of the sanguine ants and the 

 pratenses which every spring carried on severe battles, 

 lasting for a whole day at a time, without either being able 

 to win supremacy. After a few days, and when the sur- 

 rounding ground was covered with the fallen, the affair 

 ended with a truce, which lasted for the rest of the fine 

 weather. A neutral territory was marked out between the 

 two nests, which was not to be infringed by either party. 

 But if one or several ants were placed on the hostile nest 

 bitter war again broke out. 



On the 17th of April, 1870, Forel placed a handful of 

 black pratenses on a nest of the same species, but of a rather 

 lighter variety or sub-species. A most infuriated battle 

 followed from which only four or five of the black ants 

 escaped. The rest were killed in an hour's space. 



On the 12th of May, 1871, Forel saw a fight between the 

 large brown Myrmica sQabrinodis lobicornoides and a small 

 Myrmica scabrinodis of a yellow brown shade. The battle 

 began by the more numerous small ants taking prisoner 

 some of the large ones which had approached their nest. 

 Fugitives carried the alarming news to the nest of the latter 

 and a general battle was the result. The large ants ad- 

 vancing in masses quickly broke through the order of battle 

 of the small, freed the prisoners and put their enemies to 

 flight, But the latter hid themselves in the unevennesses of 

 the ground in the depths of which was their nest, and sought 

 thence to do as much harm as possible to their foes. Forel 

 saw one of the large ants seized by three of the smaller, 

 and pulled into the depth of the nest through a small hole. 

 The small ones taken prisoner by the large were killed or 

 dragged half dead to the nest, the large ones making so 

 much noise with their stings and mandibles that Forel could 

 hear the crackling against the hard and ribbed thorax of their 

 enemies. The army of the large ants remained for a mo- 

 ment on the field of victory while they tried to penetrate 

 through the nest holes of the small. But the latter had so 

 well stopped up their entrances that the attempt did not 

 succeed. The whole battle had only lasted for a quarter of 

 an hour. 



One clay Forel put two handfuls of pratenses of two 

 different sub-species or varieties before a strong nest of 



