18 JOURNAL, BOMBAY NATURAL HiiSTORY SOCIETY, 1892. 



which must be secured, working against time — such a find may 

 be, for instance^ a dead branch lying on the ground covered with 

 white ant galleries, if by any chance these galleries have been 

 broken open — then the lucky finder seizes a termite, and starts for 

 home at a * wolf's trot,' and very shortly, a column of ants 4 or 5 

 abreast and several yards long is making for the spot at the double.* 

 The Dorylidce are a mysterious folk, living deep in the bowels of the 

 earth, and nocturnal in their habits. Of the manners and customs 

 of Dorylus (or *ponerine branch' as I may call them) I know 

 practically nothing. GEnictus (=myrmicine branch) is a disciplined 

 Lohopelta, and bears the same relation to the Poneridce, as the Zulu 

 to the ordinary African negro. No individual foraging is under- 

 taken, all is done, as Lubbock puts it," in armies." The formation 

 is usually wider than among the Poneridce. CE nidus, though 

 belonging to the ' Myrmicine branch,' has retained the very charac- 

 teristic ponerine method of carrying the prey, beneath the thorax 

 and abdomen, her legs straddling over it ; a method unknown to 

 the other Families. f The MyrmicidcB, in part at least, have reached 

 the agricultural stage. Species which carry home food they have 

 found, in their stomachs, are comparatively the exception. The 

 lowest in the scale would seem to habitually carry home vegetable 

 products, though some do not seem to store them. The harvester 

 ■par excellence is Pheidole, who is run very close however by Holco- 

 myrmex and Solenopsis, both these latter, handicapped by their short 

 legs, so unsuited for cross-country work, have evolved the road- 

 making instinct (finding that course easier perhaps than evolving 

 longer legs). Pheidole, nothing behind however in engineering 

 genius, practises a system of embankment against floods, fit to make 

 a Hollander green with envy. Cataulacus has lagged somewhat, she 

 seems to store no grain (though she certainly brings home vegetable 

 products), she keeps cattle, however, in the nest. Cremastogastei\ 

 while only exceptionally using roads and omitting altogether to store, 



t That Loiopelta does "not always follow this routine, however, is shown in an 

 interesting Note by Mr. Aitken on L. chinensis, which will be found further on, and 

 which shows them adopting pure Doryline tactics. 



:i: It is curious that, in Europe, Pohjergus, a genus of the Formicidm, and the 

 chief ' slave dealer', has adopted this peculiar method of transport. 



