Cuap. VIII. A TERMITES COLONY. 211 
composed, and soldiers make their appearance. The observations of 
Smeathman on the soldiers of a species inhabiting tropical Africa are 
often quoted in books on Natural History, and give a very good idea 
of their habits. I was always amused at the pugnacity displayed, when, 
in making a hole in the earthy cemented archway of their covered 
roads, a host of these little fellows mounted the breach:to cover the 
retreat of the workers. The edges of the rupture bristled with their 
armed heads as the courageous warriors ranged themselves in compact 
line around them. They attacked fiercely any intruding object, and 
as fast as their front ranks were destroyed, others filled up their places. 
When the jaws closed in the flesh, they suffered themselves to be torn 
in pieces rather than loosen their hold. It might be said that this 
instinct is rather a cause of their ruin than a protection when a colony 
is attacked by the well-known enemy of Termites, the ant-bear; but 
it is the soldiers only which attach themselves to the long worm-like 
tongue of this animal, and the workers, on whom the prosperity of the 
young brood immediately depends, are left for the most part unharmed. 
I always found, on thrusting my finger into a mixed crowd of Termites, 
that the soldiers only fastened upon it. Thus the fighting caste do in 
the end serve to protect the species by sacrificing themselves for its 
good. 
A family of Termites consists of workers as the majority, of soldiers, 
and of the King and Queen. These are the constant occupants of a 
completed Termitarium. The royal couple are the father and mother 
of the colony, and are always kept together, closely guarded by a de- 
tachment of workers in a large chamber in the very heart of the hive, 
surrounded by much stronger walls than the other cells. They are 
wingless, and both immensely larger than the workers and soldiers. 
The Queen, when in her chamber, is always found in a gravid condition, 
her abdomen enormously distended with eggs, which, as fast as they 
come forth, are conveyed bya relay of workers in their mouths from 
the royal chamber to the minor cells dispersed throughout the hive. 
The other members of a Termes family are the winged individuals : 
these make their appearance only at a certain time of the year, gene- 
rally in the beginning of the rainy season. It has puzzled naturalists 
to make out the relationship between the winged Termites and the 
wingless King and Queen. It has also generally been thought that 
the soldiers and workers are the larve of the others: an excusable 
mistake, seeing that they much resemble larve. I satisfied myself, 
after studying the habits of these insects daily for several months, 
that the winged Termites were males and females in about equal 
numbers, and that some of them, after shedding their wings and 
pairing, became Kings and Queens of .new colonies; also, that the 
soldiers and workers were individuals which had arrived at their full 
growth without passing through the same stages as their fertile brothers 
and sisters. 
A Termitarium, although of different shape, size, texture of materials, 
and built in different situations, according to the species, is always com- 
posed of a vast number of chambers and irregular intercommunicating 
galleries, built up with particles of earth or vegetable matter, cemented 
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