ANTS 261 



with gentle taps of its antennas on the little creature's 

 stomach, first on one side, then on the other. The 

 milch-louse allows itself to be seduced by these 

 friendly overtures, and a drop of liquid oozes out at 

 the end of the tubes, the ant sucking it up at once. 

 A second louse is visited, and it too is solicited in the 

 same caressing fashion. It yields its drop of liquid 

 and lets itself be milked, after which the ant passes 

 without delay to a third louse, which it coaxes in like 

 manner. A fourth, probably already drained, with- 

 stands the wheedling, whereupon the ant, perceiving 

 that nothing is to be hoped for there^ proceeds to a 

 fifth member of the herd and obtains what it desires. 

 A few of these mouthfnls are enough to satisfy an 

 ant, and then it returns to its home. 



"Certain ants are great stay-at-homes: for them 

 it would be a painful infliction to have to go out into 

 the world. In order to spare themselves this neces- 

 sity they raise plant-lice and pasture them in en- 

 closures very near the ant-hill so that the milking 

 may be done at leisure. These herded plant-lice are 

 their precious possession, and the community is more 

 or less rich as it owns more or less of this property. 

 It constitutes the ants' flocks and herds, their cows 

 and goats. They build underground stables among 

 the grass-roots, and there keep the plant-lice which 

 they obtain from a distance, just as we gather our 

 domestic animals under the roof of barn or fold. 



"Others display an even more curious ingenuity: 

 they take possession of the lice living on some branch 

 or twig of a growing bush, and, jealously watchful 



