118 FOEMICID.E. 



portion strongly curved and passing into the steeply-sloped apical 

 portion. Pedicel elongate, the joints clavate, gradually thickening 

 into a rounded node at apex ; abdomen very broad, cordate, convex 

 above. 



Myrmicaria brunnea, so far as rny experience goes, is a very 

 common ant in Burma and Tenasserirn, and also at Kandy in 

 Ceylon. It always nests in the ground, by preference at the foot 

 of a tree, heaping up the excavated earth in grains round the 

 entrance, making a sort of fortification. Messrs. Eothney and 

 Wroughton compare the heaps to volcanic craters. I have never 

 seen Myrmicaria attending aphidse, bugs, or lepidopterous larvae, 

 nor have I found any ant-cattle or other insects in their nest. 

 The one common species is often found on trees, and abounds on 

 the flowers of mango-trees in Burma. A nest at the foot of a 

 mango-tree in my compound at Maul main was to my knowledge 

 continuously inhabited by a populous colony of M. brunnea for 

 six years ; but Mr. Rothney has recorded the existence of a nest 

 in Barrackpore park, which apparently occupied the same site for 

 over twenty years. 



Key to the Species. 



a. Head more or less striate ; mandibles finely 



striate ; pronotuni anteriorly convex, not 



raised M. brunnea, p. 118. 



b. Head and mandibles smooth, not striate ; pvo- 



notum raised in front, lateral!}' tuberculate 



above, not convex M. birmana, p. 119. 



137. Myrmicaria brunnea, Sounders, Trans. Ent. Soc. iii (1841), 



p. 57, pi. v, fig. 2, d 1 . 



Myrmica fodiens, Jerdon, Madr. Jour. L. S, xvii (1851), p. 115, 

 <3 2 ; Emery, Bull. Soc. Ent. Ital. xxiii (1891), p. 16(5. 



. Chestnut-brown, shining ; mandibles finely and closely, 

 head and thorax more or less widely, longitudinally striate ; the 



Fig. 55. Myrmicaria brunnea, $ . a. Antenna, b. Thorax in profile. 



nodes of the pedicel smooth or only slightly rugulose ; abdomen 

 polished aud smooth ; pilosity long, abundant, reddish yellow, 



