TERMITES OR WHITE ANTS. 669 



and the latter have a transparent tip to the labrum and a toothless 

 margin to the mandibles. The second is represented by 7. vulgaris; 

 it builds insignificantly small mounds or none at all; the imago is large, 

 but the soldiers are of moderate size, have a few bristles at the tip 

 of the labrum and a minute tooth at the middle of the cutting margin 

 of each mandible, or at any rate of the left one. The last group, repre- 

 sented by T. incertus, has individuals of moderate size and quite differ- 

 ent habit from those of the previous groups. 



A remarkable group, in which the soldiers have a very large foramen 

 in front of the head, from which when angry they can discharge a 

 copious viscid milky fluid, has been given the subgenera- name Copfn- 

 termes by Herr Wasmann. The group is quite worthy of generic 

 rank. 



Another remarkable group, in which the soldiers have a minute 

 foramen in front of the head and a long labrum reaching to the tips 

 of the strongly toothed mandibles, was given the subgeneric name 

 Rliinotermes by Dr. Hagen. This group also is worthy of generic 

 rank. * * * 



These groups, the fungus-growers, Coptotermes and Rhinotet^mes, 

 have soldiers with pronotum more or less flat, and antenna' of usually 

 more than 14 segments, and abdominal papillae usually easily visible. 

 They have imagos in which the wings show the median nerve midway 

 between the submedian and subcostal. The remaining groups, con- 

 taining much the larger number of the species, have imagos, in which 

 the wings show the median nerve much nearer the submedian than the 

 subcostal, and soldiers whose antennae have seldom more than 1-i seg- 

 ments. It is to these that Dr. Hagen gave the subgeneric name 

 Eutermes; they comprise numerous groups, with difficulty recognized 

 by the imagos, but readily recognized by the soldiers. The Euterme 

 had been previously applied by Heer to some fossil forms of the genus 

 Termes, known only from the imago, and in one case only from the 

 wings. The name was limited b} T Dr. Fritz Midler to a much smaller 

 group, that in which the soldiers have rudimentary mandibles and a 

 long, conical rostrum. He raised this group to generic rank. It is a 

 natural group, worthy of generic rank, if indeed it be not worthy of 

 forming several genera, but it was not in this sense that Heer or Hagen 

 used the name Eutermes. * * * 



The species of the genus Ternu s seem in some cases to be very distinct 

 and readily distinguishable, and in other cases to pass indistinguish- 

 ably into one another. In the groups in which the species are not easily 

 distinguishable, I have not attempted to outdo nature in distinctness; 

 indeed, in this respect I am conscious of shortcomings. In every case 

 I trust that more reliance will be placed on my specimens than on my 

 descriptions. 



