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THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY, 



thirty or forty feet in diameter, and ten or fifteen in height, or again 

 standing out against the sky like obelisks, their bare sides carved 

 and fluted into all sorts of fantastic shapes. In India these ant- 

 heaps seldom attain a height of more than a couple of feet, but in 

 Central Africa they form veritable hills, and contain many tons of 



Fig. 4. Galleries in White Ants' Nest. 



earth. The brick houses of the Scotch mission-station on Lake Nyassa 

 have all been built out of a single ants' nest, and the quarry from 

 which the material has been derived forms a pit beside the settlement 

 some dozen feet in depth. A supply of bricks as large again could 

 probably still be taken from this convenient depot, and the missiona- 

 ries on Lake Tanganyika and onward to Victoria Nyanza have been 

 similarly indebted to the labors of the termites. In South Africa the 

 Zooloos and Caffres pave all their huts with white-ant earth ; and during 

 the Boer war our troops in Praetoria, by scooping out the interior from 

 the smaller beehive-shaped ant-heaps, and covering the top with clay, 

 constantly used them as ovens. These ant-heaps may be said to abound 

 over the whole interior of Africa, and there are three or four distinct 

 varieties. The most peculiar, as well as the most ornate, is a small 

 variety from one to two feet in height, which occurs in myriads along 

 the shores of Lake Tanganyika. It is built in symmetrical tiers, and 

 resembles a pile of small rounded hats, one above another, the rims 

 depending like eaves, and sheltering the body of the hill from rain. 

 To estimate the amount of earth per acre raised from the water-line 

 of the subsoil by white ants would not in some districts be an impos- 

 sible task, and it would be found probably that the quantity at least 



