wheelek: ants of the genus opisthopsis. 355 



Sculpture and pilosity as in the worker, except that the head and 

 thorax are as smooth and shining as the gaster. 



Color like that of the worker, but with the scutellum and metanotal 

 sclerite black and the wing-insertions dark brown. Wings yellowish 

 hyaline, with pale brown veins and pterostigma. Eyes black. 



Male. Length 4^.5 mm. 



Head through the eyes as broad as long, with straight, anteriorly 

 converging cheeks as long as the eyes. Mandibles small, with acute 

 tips and oblique, edentate apical borders. Clypeus ecarinate. Frontal 

 carinae short. Antennae slender; scapes as long as the seven basal 

 joints of the funiculus; first funicular joint as long as the second but 

 thicker; all the funicular joints subequal, more than twice as long as 

 broad. Thorax through the mesonotum a little broader than the 

 head through the eyes, convex and prominent in front. Epinotum 

 very convex, sloping, without distinct base and declivity. Petiole 

 lower and thicker than in the worker, cuneate in profile, its superior 

 border rather blunt and rather deeply and angularly notched in the 

 middle. Gaster slender, with small, slender, exserted genitalia. 

 Legs slender. Wings with small, triangular discal cell. 



Shining and distinctly shagreened; head rather opaque above; 

 mesonotum sparsely and coarsely punctate. 



Pilosity as in the worker, but with short, sparse erect hairs also on 

 the mesonotum. 



Black; antennae piceous brown; mandibles, corners of the cheeks, 

 mouthparts, legs, and wing-insertions yellowish brown, the middle 

 portions of the femora darker. Wings grayish hyaline, with pale 

 brown veins and pterostigma. Eyes pearl-gray. 



Murray Islands: Torres Strait, type-locality (A. C. Haddon). 

 Queensland: Townsville (W. W. Froggatt)'; Laura, Cape York, and 

 Colosseum (E. Mjoberg) ; Koah, Kuranda, and Townsville (Wheeler) ; 

 Cairns (A. M. Lea). Northern Territory: Point Charles (G. F, 

 Hill); Daly River (H. Wesselmann); Melville Island (F. P. Dodd). 

 Central Australia: Tennant's Creek (J. F. Field). North West 

 Australia: Broome, Kimberley District (E. Mjoberg). 



Redescribed from a worker cotype and numerous specimens of all 

 three phases taken by myself in termite nests at Koah, Kuranda, and 

 Townsville. Dr. E. Mjoberg had previously observed its occurrence 

 in these structures. More rarely it nests under stones without 

 relations to termites. The winged sexual phases were found in the 

 nests October 31 to November 6. The species is evidently widely 

 distributed over tropical Australia and will probably be found in New 

 Guinea. 



