212 SOCIAL BEHAVIOUR 
were distended to three times their previous size. He then 
took one of these gorged individuals, and placed it among 
those that had not been fed. The replete ant was at once 
explored by touches of the other ants and surrounded, and food 
was begged from it. It responded to the demands by feeding 
a small specimen from its mouth, and when this little one had 
received a good supply, it in turn communicated some thereof 
to other specimens; while the original well-fed one also 
supplied others, and thus the food was speedily distributed. 
This habit of receiving and giving food is of the greatest 
importance in the life-history of ants.” * It affords the basis 
or starting-point of the keeping of aphides, the making of 
slaves, the curious development of honey-pot ants, and in some 
cases the association with ants of other insects. 
Some of these insects, of which there are many species 
belonging to several orders, are parasitic ; others appear to be 
hostile, and yet are able to maintain themselves in the nest ; 
others simply live side by side with the ants, which seem to be 
neither hostile nor friendly to them. In some of these cases 
the biological purpose of the association is unknown, while in 
others the ant serves as a model which the associated insect 
mimics. Thus in the nest of an Indian ant (Sima rufa-nigra) 
occur a small wasp and a spider which, to some extent in form 
and more markedly in coloration, mimic their hosts. ‘‘ Where- 
ever you find this species in any numbers,” says Mr. Rothney,t 
“if you watch a few moments, you will see a mimicking spider, 
Salticus, running about among the ants, which it very closely 
resembles in appearance, much more so in life than in set 
specimens placed side by side ; I have seen numbers on the 
most friendly footing with the ants, though I have never seen 
them enter their burrows. ... They are, I should say, the 
only friends the ant has, with the exception of a sand-wasp, a 
new species of Ahinopsis since described by Mr. Cameron, 
which also very closely mimics the ant, and which, on first 
* Sharp, op. ett., p. 147. 
+ G. A. J. Rothney, “Notes on Indian Ants,” Trans. Ent, Soe., 1889, 
_ p. 354, 
