Jan., '06] ENTOMOLOGICAL NEWS. 27 



have to sleep in the portal, as at San Juan the best " room" 

 I could get had no window. 



In September I spent a week at Tuxpan, near the construc- 

 tion camp of that branch of the Mexican Central Railway and 

 about 30 miles from the volcano of Colima. That was a lonely 

 place, but the volcano, looking down on all the country round 

 and expressing its varying moods in wreaths of white steam or 

 black smoke or casting a red glow on the clouds at night, was 

 a companion to me. Although much nearer the sea level, 

 Tuxpan is cool in summer and has many nearctic besides 

 tropical forms of insects. The leaf-cutter ant cuts roads 

 through the grass and the Kelep ant swarms up the stems of 

 shrubs in the same field. At this time I did not know that 

 this large ant was the one introduced against the boll weevil, 

 although I looked for the latter in vain. The natives of Tux- 

 pan have some strange ceremonies developed from Indian 

 dances and ideas gotten from Spanish missionaries, and the 

 place is of interest to a tourist. Returning to Guadalajara I 

 remained until the latter part of September, when I left the 



Republic. 



■ «•» ■ 



A New Fossil Ant 



By T. D. A. Cockerell. 



Florissant, not far from Pike's Peak, in Colorado, has long 

 been known as a wonderful locality for fossil plants and insects. 

 It is, in fact, a sort of Tertiary Pompeii where the fauna and 

 flora of an ancient period are almost perfectly preserved in fine 

 mud and sand, ejected by the volcanoes which at that time 

 were in full operation in the Rocky Mountain region. During 

 the present year, collections have been made at Florissant by 

 Judge J. Henderson and Dr. F. Ramaley, of the University of 

 Colorado, and while most of the specimens are plants, there 

 are a few insects. In the first railroad cutting east of Floris- 

 sant was obtained an excellently preserved spider, C/udwna 

 arcana Scudder, £ ; at a different place, the northwest corner 

 of " Fossil Stump Hill," an ant was found belonging to an 

 undescribed species. 



