WHITE ANTS. 63 



or assemblage of nurseries, chambers, &c., has a flattish top 

 or roof, without any perforation, which would keep the 

 apartments below dry, in case through accident the dome 

 should receive any injury, and let in water : and it is never 

 exactly flat and uniform, because the labourers are always 

 adding to it by building more chambers and nurseries ; so 

 that the divisions or columns between the future arched 

 apartments resemble the pinnacles upon the points of some 

 old buildings, and demand particular notice, as affording 

 one proof that for the most part the insects project their 

 arches, and do not make them by excavation. The sub- 

 terraneous passages which run under the lowest apartments 

 in the hill, in various directions, are of an astonishing size, 

 being wider than the bore of a large cannon. These pas- 

 sages or galleries, which are very thickly lined with the 

 same kind of clay of which the hill is composed, ascend 

 the inside of the external shell in a spiral manner, winding 

 round the whole building up to the top, and intersecting 

 each other at different heights, opening either immediately 

 into the dome in various places, or into the interior buildings, 

 the new turrets, &c., and sometimes communicating there- 

 with by other galleries of different bores or diameters, either 

 circular or oval. From every part of these large galleries 

 are various small pipes or galleries, leading to different 

 parts of the building. Under the ground there are a great 

 many which lead downwards by sloping descents, three and 

 four feet perpendicularly, among the gravel ; from this the 

 labouring Termites cull the finer parts, which, being worked 

 up in their mouths to the consistence of mortar, form 

 that solid clay or stone of which all their hills and build- 

 ings, except the nurseries, are composed. Other galleries 

 again ascend, leading out horizontally on every side, and 

 are carried under ground, near to the surface, a vast dis- 

 tance; for if you destroy all the nests within a hun- 



