British Oligocene Ants. 91 



the genotype. They possess the small head, small discoidnl 

 cell, long cubital cell, etc., but are considerably larger, and it 

 is, perhaps, best to treat them as a distinct species. One 

 I. 9028] is a dealated female, 5*5 mm. long ; the other 

 I. 8517] is winged, and is 6 mm. long; fore wing 6 mm. ; 

 hind wing 3*5 mm. Although the neuration of the wing is 

 clear enough to show its correspondence with that of. L. gurnet- 

 ensis, it is too indistinct for exact measurement. 



Oligocene at Gurnet Bay (Brodie). 



Holotype, (b. 115), I. 8517 (PI. V. fig. 10). 



Paratype, (b. 64), I. 9028. 



Tribe Oecophyllini, Forel. 

 Genus Oecophylla, F. Smith. 



This genus occurs at the present day in Africa, India (with 

 Ceylon etc.), Australia, and New Guinea. These ants arc 

 famous on account of their interesting habit of employing 

 their larvse to sew together the leaves and other materials of 

 which their nests are constructed. 



Wheeler (1914), in his most important work on the ants 

 of the Baltic amber, mentions two species — 0. brisckei, Mayr, 

 of which he had examined thirty-six workers and two males 

 (which he describes), and 0. brevinodis, newly described from 

 a single worker. Emery (1891) described the worker of 

 another species — 0. sicula — from the Sicilian amber, and 

 (Jockerell based three more species on five specimens from 

 the Isle of Wight deposit. 



Oecophylla megarche, Cockerell (1915, p. 486). 



Of the large series of Oecophylla I have seen from the 

 Gurnet Bay locality, forty-two specimens appear to belong to 

 this species. 



Cockerell gives the length of the fore wing as 20*5 mm.; 

 but his specimen, which unfortunately has to be the holotype, 

 is not complete. In the complete wings before me (some 

 nine specimens) the length varies from 22 to 24*5 mm., the 

 other measurements of the cells and veins varying in propor- 

 tion. The upper section of the basalis is longer than that of 

 the lower, and the two sections are in a straight line. The 

 length of the hind wing described by Cockerell is 16 mm. ; 

 that of three hind wings which I have examined is 18 mm. Ifc 

 may be worth while to mention that the length of the fore 

 wing in the modern Oecophylla smaragdina is about 16 mm. 

 and that of the hind wins; 10 mm. 



