FOSSIL AXTS. 



161 



the higher, or apocrital division of the order, but its affinities are very 

 obscure. We are thus led to the conclusion that, although both the 

 lower and higher divisions of the Hymenoptera are represented in the 

 Mesozoic, no ants are included in the number. But so many genera 

 and species of these insects appear full-fledged in the early Tertiary 

 that we are compelled to believe that they must have existed in the 

 Trias or even in the Lias, but belonged to so few genera and species 

 or lived in such small communities that they left no remains. 



The numerous species of Tertiary ants not only belong to many 

 different genera but often to living genera, and even the extinct types 

 are readily referable to the recent subfamilies and to no others. The 

 extinct genera, moreover, are of such a character that one would not 

 be surprised to discover any of them alive today in some of the unex- 

 plored portions of the Old World tropics. Among these Tertiary ants 

 the male, female and worker phases were as sharply differentiated as 

 they are today. Joseph Le Conte (" Elements of Geology," p. 511) is, 

 therefore, mistaken when, from the fact that nearly all the fossil ants 



FIG. 88. Worker of Prionoiuyrme.r 

 longiccf>s. a primitive Ponerine ant 

 from the Baltic Amber. (Original.) 



FIG. 89. Worker of Bradoponera 

 tneieri from the Baltic Amber. (Mayr.) 

 a, From the left side ; b, head from 

 above. 



of ( )eningen and Radoboj are males and females, he infers that " the 

 wingless condition, the neutral condition, the wonderful instincts and 

 organized social habits, have been developed together since flic Miocene 

 epoch." I shall show presently that had he consulted Heer's work on 

 these insects (1847), ne would not have made this statement. 



Tertiary ants have been found in both Europe and North America 

 in some 23 localities, representing several geological periods and forma- 

 tions. The following are the European formations : Baltic amber, beds 

 of Aix in the Provence and Gurnet Bay. Isle of Wight ( Lower Oligo- 



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