296 WHEELER— ANT LARV^. 



As soon as the fragments of insects are placed on the larva's trough-like 

 ventral surface, the latter is sometimes inundated with a copious, colorless 

 liQuid, which is at once eagerly lapped up by the attendant nurse. 



f should now describe this behavior in the following words : As soon 

 as the fragments are placed on its ventral surface, the larva dis- 

 charges from its salivary glands a supply of secretion which is some- 

 times very abundant. This secretion, by means of a strong proteo- 

 l}1;ic ferment which it contains, digests the food extraintestinally 

 and thus enables the larva to swallow and assimilate it, and at the 

 same time serves in part as an agreeable draught for the nurse. 

 The strong mandibles of the Ponerine larv?e are used for comminut- 

 ing the insect food and thus preparing it for the action of the saliva. 

 The larval feeding habits of our small northern species of Fo;zrra and 

 Stigmatotmna are essentially the same as those of the Texan genera, 

 as I showed in a special paper (1900a). 



Within recent years I have examined the larvae of a -number of 

 different Ponerinse and have found them all to possess well-devel- 

 oped mandibles. All, in my opinion, except, perhaps, during their 

 very youngest stages, are fed with fragments of insects, supplied 

 directly by their nurses. In some species, the insect prey is prob- 

 ably given to the larva without previous dismemberment. I here 

 describe and figure the young of three genera, Myrmecia, Mcga- 

 poncra and Bothroponera, as they differ considerably from one an- 

 other and from all previously described Ponerine genera and will 

 serve therefore to illustrate the diversity of larval structure within 

 the subfamily. 



Fig. I is from a photograph of the adult larva of Myrinccia saii- 

 gitinea, one of the larger Australian bulldog ants, the most primitive 

 of existing Formicidse. It is milk-white, has the form of a vege- 

 table marrow, with all the segments distinct, except those at the 

 extreme posterior end of the body, the anterior segments are very 

 slender and curved and the head is very small. The body is rather 

 uniformly clothed with short, rapidly tapering, bristle-like hairs. 

 Under a higher magnification the head (Fig. 2) is seen to have a 

 projecting bilobed clypeus (r), broad, heavily chitinized, coarsely 

 tridcntate mandibles (in) and well-developed maxillae (x) and 

 labium (/), the former with two pairs of strongly chitinized peg- 



