( viii ) 



environment as far as colour is concerned, and were thus 

 protected by resemblance to their surroundings. 



Mr. G. A, James Kothney exhibited a large collection of 

 Indian ants, numbering about ninety species, collected by 

 himself on the Bengal side of India in the years 1872 to 1886, 

 and which he thought might be considered as fairly repre- 

 senting the ants of the Calcutta district. He also read the 

 following notes on the subject :— 



" The following eighteen species were described from my 

 specimens by Dr. Mayr in his 'Beitrage zur Ameisen Fauna 

 Asiens,' 1878: — Canipoiiotiis opaciventris, Poli/rhachis spinifjer, 

 DoJichoderus Qracilipes, Anochetus punctiventria, Lohopelta puncti- 

 ventris, Lioponera lonf/itarsns, ^Enictus he^ii/alensis, M. hrevicornis, 

 Monomo7-iu)ii oricntale, Jlolcomyrinex scabriceps, Tetramorinm 

 Sniithi, Pheidulestriativentris, P. rhomhinoda, P.indica, Cremato- 

 fpister stibinidd, C. PiogenJwferi, C. Fiothneyi, C. contemta; and Dr. 

 Forel, to whom I am immensely indebted for a most careful 

 examination and revision of my collection, has recently 

 named the following new species : — Playlolepis Rothneyi, Cre- 

 matogaster Minchinii, and Carnponotus junctus (new race of 

 macnlatus) ; and there are also some ten species and one 

 new genus which Dr. Forel has not yet determined. In 

 reviewing the collection, there are four species which are 

 so common and conspicuous that they force themselves 

 on everyone's notice, and are familiar to Europeans and 

 natives alike ; they are : — Camp(motus compressus, Fab. (the 

 'black ant'), Solenopsis geminata, Fab., var. armata, Forel 

 (the 'red ant'), (Ecophylla smaragdina, Fab. (the 'yellow 

 ant' ; it is only the ? that has a green tinge), Sima rnfo- 

 nigra, Jerdon (the ' red and black ant '). The first may 

 be said to be represented, in ant economy, in this country by 

 our Lasius niger ; the second, by a combination of the social 

 qualities of Lasius fiavxis, Myniiica rtiginodis, Mynnica scabri- 

 nodis, and D. molesta (.1/. Pharaonis, Linn.), but for the two 

 last, which are tree-ants, we have no equivalent in our English 

 species. After ilicse four there are some twenty-six species 

 which are sufficiently in evidence to attract the notice of any 

 entomologist or observer, and which are thoroughly repre- 

 sentative; they are; — Camponotus opaciventris, Mayr, C. niicans, 



