FERTILE WORKERS. 35 
continually moved their antenne caressingly. This 
sort of attention continued until the queen, escorted by 
workers, disappeared in one of the galleries. She was 
entirely adopted, and thereafter was often seen moving 
freely, or attended by guards, about the nest, at times 
engaged in attending the larve and pupze which had 
been introduced with the workers of the strange colony. 
The workers were fresh from their own natural home, and 
the queen had been in an artificial home for a month.’ 
In no case, however, when I have put a queen into 
one of my nests has she been accepted. 
Possibly the reason for the difference may be that 
the ants on which I experimented had been long living 
inarepublic; for, I am informed, that if bees have been 
long without a queen it is impossible to induce them to 
accept another. 
Moreover, I have found that when I put a queen 
with a few ants from a strange nest they did not 
attack her, and by adding others gradually, I succeeded 
in securing the throne for her. 
It is generally stated that among ants the queens 
only lay eggs. This, however, is not correct. 
Denny! and Lespés? have shown that the workers 
also are capable of producing eggs; but the latter as- 
serted that these eggs never come to maturity. Forel, 
however, has proved? that this is not the case, but 
' Anu. and Mag. Nat. Hist., 20d ser., vol. i. 
2 Ann. des Sci. Nat., 1863. 
® four mis de la Suisse, p. 329. 
