60 HISTORY OF INSECTS. 



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 

 increased to six or eight inches, or even more, being always 

 in proportion to the size of the queen, who, increasing in 

 bulk as in age, at length requires a chamber of such dimen- 

 sions. 



The floor of this singular part is perfectly horizontal ; 

 and in large hillocks, sometimes an inch thick and upwards 

 of solid clay. The roof also, which is one solid and well- 

 turned oval arch, is generally of about the same solidity, 

 but in some places it is not a quarter of an inch thick : this 

 is on the sides where it joins the floor, and where the doors 

 or entrances are made level therewith, at pretty equal dis- 

 tances 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 different sizes, shapes, and 

 dimensions ; but all of them are arched, the arches being 

 sometimes circular and sometimes elliptical or oval. These 

 either open into each other, or communicate by passages 

 equally wide, and being always empty are evidently made 

 for the soldiers and attendants, of whom it will soon appear 

 great numbers are necessary, and of course always in wait- 

 ing. These apartments are joined by the magazines and 

 nurseries. The former are chambers of clay, and are al- 

 ways well filled with a kind of provisions, which, under the 

 microscope, appear to consist of the gums or inspissated 

 juices of plants. These are thrown together in little masses, 

 some of which are finer than others, and resemble the sugar 

 about preserved fruits ; others are like tears of gum, one 

 quite transparent, another like amber, a third brown, and 

 a fourth quite opaque, as we often see in parcels of ordi- 



