164 TRANSACTIONS OF THE [mAY 5, 



ran around until it came near enough for me to use my double 

 lens and see the parasite on its forehead between the antennae, 

 in what seems to be a dividing line. This parasite was brown in 

 color, but about the same size as the white ones. I observe that 

 the workers spend more time washing each other since the adop- 

 tion of the queens, perhaps on account of these parasites. I 

 have not found the nest of the ''jumping soldier," but it enters 

 the trunk around a decayed knot-hole. The limbs of this tree 

 are all hollow — a naturalist's paradise ; three species of wood- 

 ants, — Nasutitermes (Eutermes), Termes testaceus, and No. 20, 

 besides swarms of others. 



There is something unusual in the termitarium to-day, Sep- 

 tember 21st, 1888, and it may be death, as I crushed many the 

 time it was opened to see the queens. Six of the sexual in- 

 dividuals clustered together to-day, while the workers were ap- 

 parently building an enclosure for them, which was finished in 

 a few hours. 



October 4th, 1888. I read the article in the Scientific Ameri- 

 can you sent me last steamer; it was in the main well written, 

 though the observations have been hastily made. Some of the 

 illustrations are wretched, particularly the worker. Such man- 

 dibles, — and showing them at work ! The writer (or author) 

 evidently never owned a private termitarium. 



I have examined two more tree-nests with some profit, but 

 have had an unpreventable mishap to my termitarium, and the 

 little things seemed lost when turned out of it; and I have felt 

 the need of the familiar object of study on my centre table, 

 though I have gained from them much "food for thought," 

 stored beyond loss. I often think, while riding by these un- 

 pretentious and apparently lifeless termite tree-nests that form 

 such a conspicuous feature of thelstlimian landscape, how little 

 people know of the hidden life within, of the well-regulated 

 family of workers and young, guarded by a watchful army of 

 soldiers, and whose chief centre of attraction and solicitude is 

 a lovely queen pregnant with a progeny of untold millions. 



To an intelligent observer and lover of nature there is a 

 profitable train of thought in one of these skilfully constructed 

 nests. Tlie methodical habits; the covered galleries thronged 

 with busy workers; the watchful care of the young by wash- 

 ing and feeding; and the solicitude for the helpless queen, — 

 ready to die fo'* her ! It is marvellous, and shows a high degree 

 of intelligence and affection. As a proof, my queenless nest, 

 under my observation for four months, has adopted, without 

 hostility, several queens and sexual individuals from strange and 

 widely separated nests, even with amity and good feeling, while 



