HABITATIONS OF INSECTS. 285 



downwards, fastened to the sides without any pillars, and havins; a hole 

 through each to admit of access tq the uppermost.^ A nest constructed 

 on a similar plan, but having its exterior surface beset with numerous 

 conical knobs, is constructed by another South American wasp, remark- 

 able for collecting honey, for a valuable article on which we are indebted 

 to Mr. Adam White, who has named it Mi/rapetra scutellaris.'^ 



. I close my account of the habitations of insects with the description of 

 those constructed by the white ants, or Termites, a tribe alluded to in 

 tormer letters. 



The different species, which are numerous, build nests of various forms. 

 Some (T. atrox and niorda.v) construct upon the ground a cylindrical 

 turret of clay about three-quarters of a yard high, surrounded by a project- 

 ing conical roof, so as in shape considerably to resemble a mushroom, and 

 composed interiorly of innumerable cells of various figures and dimensions. 

 Others (as T, destructor, T. arborum Sm.) prefer a more elevated site, and 

 build their nests, which are of different sizes, from that of a hat to that of 

 a sugar-cask, and composed of pieces of wood glued together, amongst the 

 branches of trees often seventy or eii^hty feet high. But by far the most 

 curious habitations, and to which, therefore, I shall confine a minute de- 

 scription, are those formed by the Termes fatalis, a species very common 

 in Guinea and other parts of the coast of Africa, of whose proceedings we 

 have a very particular and interesting account in the 71st volume of the 

 Philosophical Transactions, from the pen of Mr. Smeathman. 



These nests are formed entirely of clay, and are generally twelve feet 

 high and broad in proportion, so that when a cluster of them, as is often 

 the case, are placed together, they may be taken for an Indian village, and 

 are in fact sometimes larger than the huts which the natives inhabit. The 

 first process in the erection of these singular structures is the elevation of 

 two or three turrets of clay about a foot high, and in shape like a sugar- 

 loaf. These, which seem to be the scaffolds of the future building, rapidly 

 increase in number and height, until at length being widened at the base, 

 joined at the top into one dome, and consolidated all round into a thick 

 wall of clay, they form a building of the size above mentioned, and of the 

 shape of a hay-cock, which, when clothed, as it generally soon becomes, 

 with a coating of grass, it at a distance very much resembles. When the 

 building has assumed this its final form, the inner turrets, all but the tops, 

 which project like pinnacles from different parts of it, are removed, and 

 the clay employed over again in other services. 



It is the lower part alone of the building that is occupied by the inhabi- 

 tants. The upper portion or dome, which is very strong and solid, is left 

 empty, serving principally as a defence from the vicissitudes of the weather, 

 and the attacks of natural or accidental enemies, and to keep up in the 

 lower part a genial warmth and moisture necessary to the hatching of the 

 eggs and cherishing of the young ones. The inhabited portion is occupied 

 by the roijal chamber, or habitation of the king and c]ueen, the nurseries 

 for the young, the storehouses for food, and innumerable galleries, passages, 

 and empty rooms, arranged according to the following plan. 



In the centre of the building, just under the apex, and nearly on a level 



J Reaum. vi. 224. Compare Lacordaire, Introd. a VEntom. ii. 508 

 " Annals of Nat, Hist. vii. 315. 



