240 
Miscellaneous. 
inquirers for it. The animal and shell are closely allied to the Den- 
talium Trachea (or imperforatuni) of Montagu {caecum of Fleming), 
for which that accurate observer of British Mollusca, Mr. Clark, pro- 
posed the significant name of Dentaliopsis. It may have been con- 
founded by British conchologists with the young of Skenea depressa, 
but is a very distinct species. The Helix nitidissima of Adams was 
evidently known to Montagu, as in one of his letters to Mr. Dillwyn 
he mentions having found “ a recent (minute) British Ammonite,” 
which this beautiful species resembles in form and markings. — 
J. Gwyn Jeffreys. 
Have Ants, when deprived of their Queen, the power of selecting one of 
their number and converting her into a fertile female ? 
Phil. Hall, Leeds, January 10, 1818. 
Dear Sir, — I shall feel obliged if any of your entomological 
readers can inform me whether they know a species of Black Ant, 
inhabiting this country, whose queen is not distinguished from the 
workers by her larger size. My reason for wishing for this infor- 
mation arises from the following circumstance : — In August 1846 I 
procured a colony of black ants, which I supposed were the Formica 
fusca, from the woods near Kirkstall Abbey. I found them beneath a 
patch of moss and stones, and consisting of about sixty individuals. 
I suspected at the time that the queen escaped me, as no one specimen 
appeared distinguished from the remainder by regal characters, which 
I frequently regretted. On the 29th of March 1847, however, when 
looking at my formicary, I observed one ant carrying a small white 
mass in its mandibles, which upon closer examination I found to my 
great astonishment was xin egg ; on the following day there were pro- 
bably twenty eggs, and the number continued to increase until June, 
when there would be at least sixty, of different sizes, and some had 
become larvm. Two of these increased in size so much as to lead 
me to suspect they would prove the larvae of queens, being consi- 
derably larger than the ants themselves. By the end of July they had 
become pupae, and were inclosed in cocoons as large as a grain of 
wheat ; these now appeared to absorb all the attention of the workers, 
and the remainder of the eggs and larvae decreased, for want, as I pre- 
sume, of sufficient attendance. During the month of August I found 
one day all dead or dying with the exception of three or four speci- 
mens, which I could not account for unless it arose from the formi- 
cary having been exposed to a great heat from the sun in my wdndow 
during the day, from which they could not escape, having forgotten 
to put up the shutters, which are for the prevention of light and too 
great a degree of heat. 
The point however upon which I want information as connected 
with the above colony is this : — From whence did the eggs proceed ? 
As I have before stated, there was not one I could suspect more than 
another of being the royal mother from external characters, while in 
seven other colonies of different species I then possessed, the identi- 
fication was very easy and self-evident. Now as we know bees when 
deprived of their queen have the power of selecting one or more 
