420 AUSTRALIAN TERMITID^E, 



the timbers of which there was introduced a South American 

 species (Eutermes tenuis, Hagen) common in Brazil. So 

 destructive did they become that several Royal Commissions 

 were appointed to consider the best methods of dealing with them. 

 MeUiss^ states that they have destroyed over £60,000 worth of 

 property in this island. 



Passing into Asia, none are recorded from the northern and 

 central countries. Crichtonf says that in some i^arts of Arabia 

 they are very destructive to young trees, which the Arabs pro- 

 tect by coating the trunks with sheep dung. Two species are 

 catalogued by Hagen from Schiraz, on the Persian Gulf, beyond 

 which until we reach India is a blank. In the latter country; 

 particularly in the southern provinces, white ants are numerous 

 and destructive, though there are apparently not a great number 

 of species among them. Termes tajwohmies, one of the commonest, 

 is very plentiful in Ceylon, also extending into Borneo, Sumatra 

 and Java, all of those islands having several other sjoecies recorded 

 from them. 



In the PhilipjDine Islands they are well known. Seoanej gives 

 an interesting account of a Spanish man-of-war which was com- 

 pletely destroyed by Termes dives while lying in the Port of 

 Ferrol. 



Doderlein§ has described a species from Japan. Mr. Knower, 

 of the Johns Hopkins University, U.S.A., a well-known worker 

 on the Termites, tells me that the common American species, 

 Termes flainpes, is recorded from Japan, but I presume it has been 

 introduced into the latter countr}^ 



Peel|| has given an account of those from Assam, and Romanis^ 

 observed them and noted the ha])its of a species (probably Termes 



'" Melliss, J. C. St. Helena, pp. 17M76, 1S75. 

 + A. Crichton. History of Arabia, Ancient and Modern. Edinb., 1883, 

 p. 461. 



% V. L. Seoane. C.E. Ent. Belg. xx. pp. xiv.-xv. 1879. 



§ L. Duderlein. Mitth. Ges Ostasiens, iii. pp. 211-212, 1881. 



II S. E. Peel. Nature, xxvi., p. 843, 1882. 



IT R. Romanis. Entomologist, xvi. pp. 214-215. 



