Remarks on some white ants 1 ). 



Dr. Hageri also remarked that Mr. Fritz Muller had sent to him some 

 white ants from Itahahy, St. Catharina, Brazil, with the following remarks: 



,,These nests of white ants are more or less regular cylinders, one span high 

 and two or three inches thick. By horizontal floors they are divided into twelve 

 or fifteen compartments or chambers. The outer surface bulges out so that one 

 can make out the number of chambers by the enlargements of the cylinder. A 

 pillar goes through all the compartments; close to this, or in it, runs an oblique 

 passage from each chamber to the next. Sometimes all these passages together 

 form a somewhat regular winding stair through all the compartments. For the 

 impregnated female these passages are too narrow, and she can therefore not 

 leave her chamber. 



There are, both in the outer wall and in the horizontal divisions, passages 

 too small to admit the passing of the winged ants; but neither in the outside 

 wall nor in the chambers is there any opening to the outside in nests which 

 have not been injured. 



In the outside wall the passages run from top to bottom. In the divisions, 

 from circumference to centre without reaching this latter. In the flat compart- 

 ments they are not to be detected from the outside; in the circumference they 

 appear as flattened ridges. In drying, the outer side of the passages falls off, 

 and then they are to be seen as deep hollows with inflated borders. In undisturbed 

 nests the only entrance seems to be on the upper surface some inches under ground.. 



The nest is not directly connected with the earth, but is surrounded by about 

 a finger's breadth of free space. The nest can, therefore, as soon as the upper 

 end is freed from earth, be easily taken out of the ground. 



I have never found in one of these nests more than one impregnated female. 

 Besides the winged ants, the eggs and the larvae, there are found two kinds of 

 laborers; of these one kind is distinguished by a truncated nose. 



Not in the nest but in the same piece of land, are found, in planting corn, 

 single white ants with disproportionately large heads and long mandibles." 



The winged ants were stated by Dr. Hagen to belong to Termes striatus, 

 or perhaps to T. similis; the imago is in too bad a condition for accurate determin- 

 ation. The soldier with truncated nose was figured by him as T. similis ; the 

 soldier with long mandibles, as T. cingulatus. 



No description of white ants' nests like this has ever been given before. 



i) Proceedings of the Boston Society of Natural History. 1871. p. 205, 206. Section of Entomology. 

 January 26. 1870. 



