1907.1 Wheeler, Funyus-ynncing Ants of North America. 725 



21. C3rphomyrmex wheeleri Forel. 



FoREL, Bull. Soc. Ent. Suisse, X, 7, 1900, pp. 282-284, $ . 



Worker. (PI. XLIX, Fig. 2.) Length: 2.-2.5 mm. 



Head, without the mandibles, longer than broad, broader behind than in front, 

 with obtusely excised posterior margin and rather sharp, ear-like posterior corners. 

 Eyes moderately large, convex, at the middle of the head. Mandibles acute, with 

 five sharp teeth. Clypeus with thin, entire anterior border. Frontal area triangular. 

 Frontal caringe with large, rounded anterior lobes, each with a circular impression, 

 and continued back as a pair of strong, straight, diverging ridges to the posterior 

 corners, where they loop around and become continuous with the postorbital carinis. 

 thus enclosing deep grooves for the antennal scapes. Each postorbital carina bears 

 a prominent tooth just behind the eye. Vertex with a pair of short longitudinal 

 ridges as far apart as each is from the posterior ridge of a frontal carina and con- 

 tinued laterally along the occipital border to the posterior corner. Here also the 

 'ears' are joined by a pair of prominent ridges from the posteroinferior surface of the 

 head. Antennal scapes very slender at the base, enlarged towards the tips which 

 reach the posterior corners of the head; joints 2-8 of the funiculus a little broader 

 than long. Pronotmn with a pair of acute inferior teeth and above with a larger 

 pair of angular humeral projections and a median pair of smaller projections. Meso- 

 notum elevated in the middle in the form of an elongate elliptical, slightly concave 

 disc, truncated behind, with a faint transverse depression on its posterior portion 

 and bordered with a prominent ridge which is interrupted in the middle in front. 

 Mesoepinotal constriction short and deep. Epinotum as high as the mesonotum, its 

 base very convex and nearly as long as the concave declivity with which it forms an 

 obtvise angle in profile. Spines laterally compressed, short and triangular, as broad 

 at the base as long, directed backward and continued forward and backward as 

 ridges on the base and declivity. There is also a pair of lateral ridges on the base. 

 Petiole nearly twice as broad as long, as broad in front as behind, with rounded 

 anterior angles; node short, compressed anteroposteriorly, with two spines, directed 

 upward and backward. Postpetiole trapezoidal, li times as broad as the petiole 

 and less than twice as broad as long, with two blunt anterior, two larger and more 

 rounded posterior protuberances and a broad, longitudinal depression in the middle; 

 posterior border entire. Gaster suboblong, distinctly longer than broad, as broad 

 in front as behind; first segment convex above, with distinct lateral ndges and a 

 faint median depression at the base. Tibise somewhat compressed; hind femora 

 curved, angularly dilated and compressed near the base on the flexor side. 



Opaque throughout; mandibles very finely and indistinctly striated. Remainder 

 of body very finely granular-punctate; antennal grooves and gaster densely and 

 distinctly punctate. 



Hairs short, glistening white, scale-like and appressed, uniformly distributed 

 over the appendages and upper surface of the body. Pubescence very fine, whiti.sh, 

 confined to the antennal funiculi. 



Yellowish ferruginous; mandibular teeth black. 



Female. Length: 2.5-2.7 nun. 



Very similar to the worker. Pronotum with prominent inferior and superior 

 teeth, the former acute, the latter larger and blunt. Me-sonotum prominent, flat- 



