262 INSECTS AND MAN 



many different species, and the differences which exist 

 between the economy of one and another are so pro- 

 nounced that generalisation is well-nigh impossible. At 

 times, towards evening, after a summer shower, the air in 

 the neighbourhood of a termite colony will be darkened 

 with flying creatures, everywhere along the ground round 

 about the insects will be scurrying. They are the male 

 and female termites in their nuptial flight, and, despite the 

 fact that they stream from the nest in prodigious numbers, 

 but few escape destruction ; their appearance is the signal 

 for hosts of hungry birds and reptiles, which collect in force, 

 to dispose of the hapless insects. When the flight is over, 

 the termites of both sexes shed their wings, and to this 

 end a crease runs right across the base of each wing, 

 along which the wing falls away at the will of the insect. 

 Hurrying along in couples, the objective of the now wingless 

 insects is some crack or hole in the earth, some sheltering 

 stone or woodwork where they may hide from their enemies. 

 Each pair that manages to escape destruction founds a 

 new termite community, being known henceforth as the 

 king and queen. These royal insects dwell in a large 

 earthen cell, situated in the heart of the termite nest, and 

 usually, though not invariably, the entrances to and exits 

 from the cell are so small that escape is impossible. In 

 some species more than one king termite may be found in 

 the royal cell, in others again no king is present. In any 

 case it is only the queen that is of special interest, for she 

 rapidly becomes nothing more nor less than an egg-laying 

 machine, capable, it is said, of laying one egg per second, 

 or eighty thousand per day. Her head, thorax, and legs 

 are still of the same dimensions as on the day she founded 

 the colony, but her abdomen has become enlarged to the 

 size of one's little finger, or about twenty thousand times 

 the size of the worker termite. This enormous distension 

 is enabled to take place owing to the expansion of the 

 elastic tissue between the original abdominal segments; 



