42 PERFECT SOCIETIES OF INSECTS. 



with increased diligence. Renew the attack, and this 

 amusing scene will be repeated : — in rush the labour- 

 ers, all disappearing in a few seconds, and out march 

 the military as numerous and vindictive as before. — 

 When all is once more quiet, the busy labourers re- 

 appear and resume their work, and the soldiers vanish. 

 Repeat the experiment a hundred times, and the same 

 will always be the result ; — you w ill never find, be the 

 peril or emergency ever so great, that one order at- 

 tempts to fight, or the other to work. 



You have seen liow solicitous the Termites are to 

 move and work under cover and concealed from obser- 

 vation : this, however, is not always the case ; — there 

 is a species larger than T. beilicosus, whose proceed- 

 ings I have been principally describing, Avhich Mr. 

 Smeathman calls the marching Termes ( Ttrmes via- 

 fiim). He was once passing through a thick forest, 

 when on a sudden a loud hiss, like that of serpents, 

 struck him with alarm. The next step produced a re- 

 petition of the sound, which he then recognised to be 

 that of white ants ; yet he was surprised at seeing none 

 of their hills or covered ways. Following the noise, 

 to his great astonishment and delight he saw an army 

 of these creatures emerging from a hole in the ground; 

 their number was prodigious, and they marched with 

 the utniost celerity. When they had proceeded about 

 a yard they divided into two columns, chietly composed 

 of labourers, about fifteen abreast, following each other 

 in close order, and going straight forward. Here and 

 there was seen a soldier, carrying his vast head with 

 apparent difficulty, and looking like an ox in a flock of 

 eheep, w ho marched on in the same manner. At the 



