166 Zoologica: N. Y. Zoological Society [HI; 4 



in the leaf-sacs of a Rosaceous myrmecophyte, Hirtella guainiie 

 Spruce (ex Hooker fil.).i 



Emery saw only workers and a few very imperfectly pre- 

 served females of schumanni. His figures show, however, that the 

 heads of both are decidedly shorter than in foveiceps, that the 

 head of the worker is not so much narrowed anteriorly and that 

 the antennae are longer, with the median joints of the funicle 

 less transverse, and the petiole of the worker more erect and with 

 a smaller node. 



Subfamily Formicinae. 

 24. — Brachyynyyviex heeri Forel. 



Colonies of this minute honey-yellow ant with brood were 

 repeatedly found in the petioles of young Tachigalias along the 

 trails near Kartabo. More frequently it nests in dead stems of 

 a very common Rubiaceous weed (Spermacoce verbillata) , or in 

 the twigs of bushes. It also occurs under the bark of old logs. 



25. — Brachymyrmex heeri var. basalis var. nov. 



Worker. Honey yellow, like the type, except the first gastric 

 segment, which is black. 



'This plant is cited by Emery in his Azteca monograph (1893) as 

 "Chrysohalanea hirtella Guainise Hoolcer til. but the "Index Kewensis" gives 

 the name as cited above. It may be of interest to quote in this connection 

 Spruce's remarks (1908, p. 395) on another species of Hirtella with ant- 

 inhabited leaf sacs: "Examples of sac-like ant-dwellings exist in the leaves 

 of plants of other orders, so like those already described in Melastomes, that 

 it is scarcely worth while to do more than indicate some of the species. The 

 solitary instance known to me in Chrysobalans is that of Hirtella physophwa 

 Mart., a slender arbuscle growing just within reach of inundations in the 

 foi-est about the mouth of the Rio Negro. The distichous, oblong, apiculate 

 leaves are nearly a foot long, and at the cordate base have a pair of com- 

 presso-globose sacs tenanted by ants. On cutting open the sacs I was rather 

 surprised to find them lined with cuticular tissue and hairs, just like the 

 underside of the leaf; which seems to show that they are produced by a 

 recurvation of the ala; of the leaf, through the ants nestling at first (Aphis- 

 like) under the leaf and causing it to become bullate, and that the recurved 

 margins have at length reached and coalesced with the midrib so as to 

 form a pair of seas." The fanciful explanation in the concluding sentence 

 was evidently in part responsible for the unfortunate refusal of the Linnean 

 Society to publish Spruce's very valuable paper when it was presented 

 in 1869. 



