FOSSIL AXTS. 165 



of the Baltic amber have been studied in a masterly manner by Mayr 

 (18680). A few additional species from the same formation were sub- 

 sequently described by Ern. Andre (18950) and Emery (1905^), and 

 the latter has also described fourteen species from the Sicilian amber 

 (1891*). 



According to Handlirsch's list of fossil insects, of the 600 species 

 of Hymenoptera that have been described from the Tertiary, 307 or 

 more than half are ants. These insects must therefore have been very 

 numerous in individuals, just as they are to-day. This is true alike of 

 the Baltic amber and the shales of Radoboj, Oeningen and Florissant. 

 Mayr examined 1,460 ants from the amber, Ern. Andre 698 and 

 through the kindness of Prof. R. Klebs, of the Royal Amber Museum 

 of Kpnigsberg and Prof. W. Tornquist of the Konigsberg Uni- 

 versity, I have been able to study nearly 5,000 of these beautiful 

 specimens. Heer says : ' ' The ants are among the commonest fossil 

 animals of Oeningen and Radoboj. In the latter locality they pre- 

 dominate even more in proportion to the other insects than they do at 

 Oeningen. Altogether I have examined 301 specimens, representing 

 64 species; from Oeningen 151 specimens of 30 species, from Radoboj 

 143 specimens of 37 species and from Parschlug 7 specimens belonging 

 to 4 species." According to Scudder (1890), "the ants are the most 

 numerous of all insects at Florissant, comprising, perhaps four-fifths of 

 all the Hymenoptera ; I have already about four thousand specimens of 

 perhaps fifty species (very likely many more) ; they are mostly Formi- 

 cidae, but there are not a few Myrmicidse and some Poneridse." I 

 have recently made a rapid preliminary study of the 4,000 specimens of 

 the Scudder collection belonging to the Museum of Comparative 

 Zoology, and of nearly 3,000 more found at Florrisant by Prof. T. D. 

 A. Cockerell, Mrs. W. P. Cockerell, S. Rohwer and myself, and am 

 able to confirm Scudders statement. There are probably not more 

 than 50 species in both collections, many of them being represented by 

 a great number of specimens, and hardly 70, or one per cent., of the 

 7,000 specimens are workers. 



Of the described Tertiary ants that can be unmistakably assigned to 

 their respective subfamilies, 139 species are Camponotinre, 25 are Doli- 

 choderinas, 85 Myrmicinae and 27 Ponerinse. A single species (. luoinina 

 rubella'] is referred to the Dorylina? by F. Smith (1868). I have not 

 seen his description and figure of this insect, but his generic determi- 

 nations of recent ants were often so erroneous that his competence to 

 assign a fossil species to its proper genus may be doubted. The pro- 

 portion of species in the other subfamilies is interesting because it is 

 not unlike that obtaining at the present day. The number of indi- 



