%l\t Canadian Jpitomolonht. 



Vol. XXXIV. LONDON, JULY, 1902. No. 7 



CLASSIFICATION OF THE FOSSORIAL, PREDACEOUS AND 



PARASITIC WASPS, OR THE SUPERFAMILY 



VESPOIDEA. 



BY WILLIAM H. ASHMEAD, A. M .. ASSISTANT CURATOR, DIVISION OF INSECTS, 



U. S. NATIONAL MUSEUM. 



(Paper No. 6. — Continued from p. 137.) 



Family XXVIIL— Vespidse. 



This family is restricted to the paper-making wasps, all social species 

 living in large communities and having three distinct sexes, female, 

 worker, and male, thus agreeing with the social bees, the Apidce. and 

 Bombidce, and with many ants, Dory I idee, Myrmicida, Formicidce, etc. 



In some species, too, like the ants, there appear to be two forms of 

 the worker. 



Deceived by their habits, for structurally they are widely separated, 

 Westwood and Packard thought the social wasps were allied to the 

 Apidce, and in their scheme of classification have placed them next to the 

 bees, with which they have nothing in common. 



Cresson, Kirby and most late writers seem to have followed them, 

 but in my opinion it is clearly an unnatural position ; they have no 

 relationship whatever with the bees, and are a component of this great 

 complex, but with affinities, through some exotic forms, allying them with 

 the next great complex, or the superfamily Formicoidea. 



Two very distinct groups, here called subfamilies, have been 

 recognized. They were first correctly indicated by C. G. Thomson, 

 the distinguished Swedish entomologist, who called them tribes. 



Table of Subfamilies. 

 Hind wings entire, without an anal lobe, mesepisterna not sep- 

 arated Subfamily I. — Vespinae. 



Hind wings with a distinct anal lobe : mesepisterna 



separated , Subfamily II. — Polistinae. 



