EATING INSECTS. 163 



they happen to emerge under a chest or trunk, early 

 in the night will pierce the bottom, and destroy or 

 spoil everything in it before the morning. 



' When the termites attack trees and branches in the 

 open air, they sometimes vary their manner of doing it. 

 If a stake in a hedge has not taken root and vege- 

 tated, it becomes their business to destroy it : if it 

 has a good sound bark round it, they will enter at the 

 bottom and eat all but the bark, which will remain, 

 and exhibit the appearance of a solid stick (which 

 some vagrant colony of ants, or other insects, often 

 shelter in till the winds disperse it) ; but if they cannot 

 trust the bark, they cover the whole stick with their 

 mortar, and it then looks as if it had been dipped into 

 thick mud that had been dried on. Under this co- 

 vering they work, leaving no more of the stick and 

 bark than is barely sufficient to support it, and fre- 

 quently not the smallest particle ; so that, upon a very 

 small tap Vvdth your walking-stick, the whole stake, 

 though apparently as thick as your arm, and five or 

 six ieet long, loses its form, and, disappearing like a 

 shadow, falls in small fragments at your feet. They 

 generally enter the body of a large tree, which has 

 fallen through age or been thrown down by violence, 

 on the side next the ground, and eat away at their 

 leisure, within the bark, without giving themselves 

 the trouble either to cover it on the outside or to re- 

 place the wood, which they have removed from within, 

 being somehow sensible that there is no necessity 

 for it. These excavated trees have deceived me two 

 or three times in running ; for, attempting to step two 

 or three feet high, I might as well have attempted to 

 step upon a cloud ; and have come down with such 

 unexpected violence, that, besides shaking my teeth 

 and bones almost to dislocation, I have been pre- 

 cipitated, head foremost, among the neighbouring 

 trees and bushes. Sometimes, though seldom, the 



