340 iulletin: museum of comparative zoology. 



Differing from tlie worker in having the epinotal spines shorter, the petiolar 

 noile thicker and less elevated. The mesothoracic punctures are coarser. 



Male. Length 2 mm. 



Head, excluding eyes, as long as broad, broadly rounded behind. Clypeus 

 slightly convex, narrowly rounded in front. Mandibles very feeble. Eyes 

 less than half as long as head, strongly convex, situated at sides at a distance 

 of two thirds their length from base of clj'peus. Antennae stout; scape shorter 

 than eyes; first funicular joint half as long as second; joints two to ten sub- 

 equal, cylindrical, about twice as long as broad; terminal joint as long as the 

 two preceding joints. Mesonotum with strong Ma3Tian furrows; longitudi- 

 nally impressed at middle. Scutellum broader than long, slightly convex. 

 Epinotum with distinct base and declivity; tuberculate at sides. Petiole 

 from above more than twice as long as broad; in profile, slender, twice as long 

 as high, the node evenly rounded and grading into the peduncle. Postpetiole 

 rounded, as long as deep and a little longer than broad. Legs slender. 



Shining, finely punctate, with rather stiff black hairs scattered on head 

 and body, legs, and scape; funiculus and legs with fine w'hite pubescence. 



Color black. Wings strongly infuscated and hairy, veins, stigma, and hairs 

 fuscous. 



Ysabel: Fulakora (T\T)e-locality). Malaita: Auki. Three Sis- 

 ters: Malapaina. 



The only colony that I found, beneath a stone at Fulakora, was a 

 small one, composed of less than a dozen workers, a deiilated female, 

 and one male. — Type. — M. C. Z. 9,173. 



In this small series there is some slight variation in the length of the 

 epinotal spines. 



Prisfoviyrmcx obcsvs differs from qvadridens Emery and coggii 

 Emery in not having teeth on the sides of pronotum. The epinotal 

 spines are shorter and thicker in typical ohcsus, but in the following 

 subspecies they are more similar to those of quadridens. 



67a. Pristomyrmex obesus Mann, subsp. melanoticus, subsp. nov. 

 Worker. Length, 2 mm. 



Differ from the typical form in the structure of the epinotal spines, w'hich 

 are much more slender and rather strongly curved upwards, similar to Emery's 

 figure of quadridens (Term, fuzet., 1897, 20, pi. 15, fig. 25). The color is dark 

 fuscous to piceous instead of ferruginous. 



San Cristoval: Pamua (Type-locality). Wai-ai. 

 Found beneath a stone. 



