942 
near the centre of the interior build- 
ing as possible, and generally about 
the height of the common surface of 
the ground, at a pace or two from 
the hillock., lt is always nearly in 
the shape of half an egg, or an ob- 
tuse oval within, and may be sup- 
posed to represent a long oven, 
In the infant state of the colony, 
it is not above an inch, or thereabout, 
in length, but in time will be in- 
creased to six or eight inches, or 
more, in the clear, being always: in 
proportion to the size of the queen, 
who, increasing in bulk as in age, at 
length requires a chamber of such 
dimensions. 
Its floor is perfectly horizontal, 
and in large hillocks, sometimes an 
inch thick and upwards, of solid 
clay. | The roof also, which is one 
solid, well turned, oval arch, is ge- 
nerally of about the same solidity, 
but in same places it is not a quarter 
of an inch thick, this is on the side 
where it joins the floor, and where 
the doors or entrances are made level 
therewith, at pretty equal distantes 
from each other. 
These entrances will not admit 
any animal larger than the soldiers 
or labourers, so that the king and 
the queen (who is, at full size, a 
thousand times the weight of a king) 
can never possibly go out. 
The royal chamber, if in a large 
hillock, is surrounded by an innu- 
merable quantity of others of dif- 
ferent sizes, shapes, and dimensions, 
but all of them arched in one way 
or another, sometimes circular, and 
sometimes elliptical! or oval. 
These either open into each other, 
or communicate by passages as 
wide, and being always empty, are 
evidently made for the soldiers and 
attendants, of whom it will soon ap- 
juices of plants, 
ANNUAL: REGISTER, 1606, 
pear, great’ numbers are necessary, 
and of course always in waiting. 
These apartments ‘are joined by 
the magazines and nurseries. \ The 
former are chambers of clay, and 
are always filled with provisions, 
which, to the naked eye, seem to 
consist of the raspings of wood and 
plants, which the termites destroy, 
but are found in the microscope to 
be principally the gums or inspissated 
These are thrown 
together in Jittle masses, some of 
which are finer than others, and re- 
semble the sugar about preserved 
fruits, others are like tears of gum, 
ove quite transparent, another like 
amber, a third brown, and a fourth 
quite opaque, as we see often in par- 
cels of ordinary gums. 
These magazines are intermixed 
with the nurseries, which are build- 
ings totally different from the-rest of 
the apartments; for these are com=-. 
posed entirely of wooden materials, 
seemingly joined together with gums. 
I call them the nurseries, because 
they are invariably occupied by the 
eggs and young ones ; which appear 
at first in the shape of labourers, but | 
white as snow. These buildings are 
exceeding cumpact, and divided into 
many very small irregular shaped 
chambers, not one of which is to be 
found of balf an inch in width ; they 
are placed all round the royal apart- 
ments, and as near as possible to 
them. 
When the nest is in the infant 
state, the nurseries are close to the 
royal chamber ; but, asin process of 
time the queen enlarges, it 1s neces- 
sary to enlarge the chamber for her 
accommodation, and as she then 
laysa greater number of eggs, and re- 
quires a greater number of attendants, 
So it is necessary to enlarge and in- 
crease 
