The Ants of the Baltic Amber. 



Table V. 



If we reduce the numbers of the genera, species and individuals 

 of the last table to percentages we have the following: 



In other words, although less than l°/o of the individual ants are 

 Ponerince, they represent more than ^/^g of the species and nearly 

 ^/g of the genera. And while the Myrmicinas genera constitute a little 

 more than ^j^ of the total number, and the species a little less than 

 ^3, the number of individuals is only a little more than 2%. Very 

 different is the condition in the Dolichoderince, which embrace only 

 about ^/g of the genera and ^/g of the species, but nearly ^j^ of all 

 the individuals. The Camponotitice, finally, are not far from consti- 

 tuting ^/g of all the genera, species and individuals. While the pro- 

 portional representation of species of the different subfamilies would, 

 I believe, not be very different in the recent ant fauna of many 

 tropical or subtropical regions as large as that in which the Baltic 

 amber was formed, the individual representation would be very different, 

 for the Ponerince would be more abundant and the DolichoderirKr 

 much less abundant as compared with the Myrmicinm and Camponotincc. 

 The explanation of this singular condition is in part, at least, 

 attributable to the selective action of the amber on the one hand and 

 to the peculiarities of habit of the different subfamilies^ of ants on 

 the other. It is well known that no large and powerful insects are 

 preserved in the amber, for the obvious reason that vigorous orga- 



