358 
HYMENOPTERA. 
adds many details from his own observation. The nests are not 
habitually abandoned every year ; and it is reckoned that one pound 
weight (avoirdupois) of seeds was contained in one nest. Wakefield's 
original observations on the habit of Formica nigra collecting seeds of 
Viola odorata are reproduced from P. L. S. ii. 
Ants instinctively realize danger, on seeing for the first time the dead 
bodies of their fellows, and they seem to dislike the taint of a track 
drawn by the human hand : C. Darwin (quoting Traherne-Moggridge 
and J. D. Hague), Nature, viii. p. 244. As to the latter point, cf. I. c. 
p. 303. 
Thirty species of ants from Calcutta, including some new (not described) 
named by F. Smith, P. E. Soc. 1873, p. viii. One of these, Sima rufi- 
nigrum, Jerdou, is simulated by a Salticus. 
A list of 19 species occurring in Voigtland (Saxony) is given by 
Kohler, with dates, localities, &c. : SB. Ges. Isis, 1873, pp. 32-34. 
Swarming of a brood of winged ants : CO. Abbott, Am. Nat. vii. 
pp. 369-371. 
Formica sanguinea. Observations on the habits of its neuters by 
T. G. Gentry, P. Ac. Philad, 1873, pp. 298 & 299, who comes to. the 
conclusions — 1, that there are 2 sets of neuters, respectively caring for the 
able and helpless members of the community ; 2, that the more vigorous 
are confined to superficial cavities ; and 3, that the young are conveyed to 
deep seated chambers, 
Formica gracilescens, Nyl., = Prenolepia longicornis, Latr., and occurs 
both in the old and new worlds : H. Lucas, Bull. Soc. Ent. Fr. (5) iii. 
p. Ixvii. 
Camponotus chrysurus, Gerst., fig. 9, erinaceus, G., fig. 10, Phiclole talpa, 
G., fig. 11 ; Gerstacker, in V. d. Decken's Reisen, iii. pt. 2, pi. xiv. 
Camponotm ligniperdus. J. Labhardt's observations on destruction 
caused by this insect (Vierteljahrsschr. Zurich. Naturf . Ges.) are reproduced 
in Das Ausland, xlv. (1872), p. 600. 
Myrmecocystus mexicanus, Westw. Its "economy fully noted, and a 
diagram of the exterior of its nest given, by H. Edwards, P. Cal. Ac. v. 
pp. 72-75 (also in Am. Nat. vii. pp. 722-726). The community consists 
of 3 distinct kinds of ants, " probably of two separate genera," viz. : — 1, 
yellow workers, nurses and feeders ; 2, yellow workers, honey -makers ; 
3, black workers, guards and purveyors. The honey-makers secrete the 
food of the entire population : the abdomen in this class is distended 
to the size of a pea. The honey is used by Mexicans as food, and they 
ascribe great healing properties to it. 
J. Blake, o^>. clt. p. 98, states that the intestine of the honey-maker is 
not continued beyond the thorax, so that the food-remains can only be 
expelled by the mouth. The honey-bag is formed by the expansion of 
the abdominal segments, which is greater on the dorsal than the ventral 
surface. 
Ectatomma (?) sociale, spp. nn., W. MacLeay, Tr. Ent. Soc. N. S. W. 
iii. p. 369, Murrumbidgee, Australia. 
Phidole acabriuscula, sp. u., Gerstacker, /. c. p 360, Endara. 
