34 Riley Presidential Address. 



The fecundity of the true queen Termite is something remark 

 able, and, based on Smeathman's observations on an African 

 species (TrniH'* hcllir.Dxti*) the fact that an egg is produced every 

 second, or some 80,000 a day in the height of the breeding- 

 season, has been commonly quoted among writers on the subject. 

 In this species the queen is sealed up in a cell which is as hard 

 as a stone, in the central and most protected part of the termi 

 tary, the cell being opened and enlarged from time to time by 

 the workers, and being also perforated by holes which admit the 

 workers to care for and feed her, while preventing the egress of 

 the female and her attendant male escort. 



Among the more curious facts connected with these Termites, 

 because of their exceptional nature, is the late development of the 

 internal sexual organs in the reproductive forms and the existence 

 of a single long-lived male a condition not parelleled among 

 other insects, so far as I am aware. Further, as Dr. Hagen has 

 pointed out, the queen represents a unique instance among insects 

 of actual growth taking place in the imago state; for the in- 

 tra-segmental ligaments not only expand, but grow with the in 

 creasing gravity of the abdomen, the stigmata actually taking 

 part in this growth, though the dorsal abdominal plates remain 

 unaffected. 



In the Hive Bee multiplication of colonies takes place by divi 

 sion, but the colonizing swarm carries in itself all the elements 



" 5 



necessary for the foundation of a new colony. In the more typi 

 cal Termites multiplication of colonies also takes place by division, 

 but this is carried out by the neuters and the various adolescent 

 stages, since there is usually but one true queen, which can not 

 be moved. The new colony, therefore, can only obtain a true 

 queen by introducing one of the royal pairs that wander about 

 after they have swarmed and thrown off their wings. That great 

 difficulty attends the establishment of such a royal pair of indi 

 viduals in a colony is illustrated by the fact that they are rarely 

 discovered among colonies of our commoner species of Termes 

 proper.* 



*From the accounts of authors there is no <liiliculty m finding the true 

 queen in most of the nest building species of Eutermes in the West Indies, 

 Central and South America; while from Smeathman's famous account of 

 Termes bellicosus in Africa, it would seem that the fertile queen is usually 

 present in the colonies. But in the species most studied, viz., Terms* lacifu- 



