Of course the aphides have no idea wherein the utility of their friendship for the ants consists, but it is not difficult for us to discover it, since the ants, by their mere presence in the aphid colony, frighten and keep off their enemies. We see, then, that the conditions for a process of natural selection are here afforded: the instinct to be friendly to the ants is thoroughly useful, and the instinct of the ants to seek out the aphides, and, instead of devouring them, to 'milk' them, is also advantageous; it must be an old acquisition, an instinct early developed, for in several species it has gone so far that the aphides are carried into the ants' nest, and are there (as one might say) kept and tended as domesticated animals. A pretty case of symbiosis between two animals is reported by Sluiter, and I mention it because it concerns a vertebrate animal, and intelligence has something to do with it. In the neighbourhood of Batavia there are frequently to be found on the coral reefs large yellow sea-anemones, with very numerous and comparatively long tentacles, and a little brightly-coloured fish, of the genus _Trachichthys_, makes use of these forests, beset with stinging-cells, to find security from its enemies. These appear to be numerous, for in an aquarium, at any rate, the little fish very soon falls a victim to one or other of them, unless he is supplied with the protective sea-anemones. When this is the case it swims blithely about among the tentacles, and the sea-anemone does not sting it; for there has been a modification of instinct on its part as well as on that of the fish. The advantage it gains from the fish is, that the latter brings large morsels of food--in the aquarium, pieces of meat--into the anemone's mouth. In doing so it tears away fibres for itself, and even if the Actinia has swallowed pieces too quickly, the fish pulls them half out of the gullet again, and only relinquishes them to be consumed by its partner when it has satisfied its own appetite. In this case, again, the modification of the instinct is the only adaptation which has been brought about by the symbiosis, and its origin seems difficult to understand. How can the fish have first formed the habit of putting its prey into the mouth of the anemone instead of eating it directly? Although in many cases it is difficult to guess at the beginnings of a process of selection, because they are scarcely discoverable in the subsequently accumulated variations, yet in this instance we may perhaps picture them to ourselves in this way: The fish was in the habit of letting fall pieces of food which could not be swallowed whole, and of diving down upon them repeatedly, to tear off a fragment each time. As the sea-floor in flat places is often covered with sea-anemones, these pieces would often sink down upon one, which would welcome it as a dainty, and set about swallowing it, slowly in its own fashion. The fish must then have found by experience that it could tear