44 LIFE IN THE INSECT WOULD. 



ant, a quarter of an inch long, raising a building 

 three times as high as a man. 



Harriet. That is wonderful. 



Aunt M. Yes; their buildings are more than 

 five hundred times their own height. 



Rene6. Aunt Mary, if a man could build a 

 house five hundred times as high as himself, 

 how high would it be ? 



Aunt M. It would be more than half a mile 

 high ; four or five times the height of the Pyra- 

 mids of Egypt. 



Anna. Such a house could not be built, 

 could it? or, if it could, it would tumble down. 



Aunt M. Such a house never has been, and 

 probably never can be, built; and yet these little 

 Termites, with no other tools than their own 

 jaws and feet, raise buildings as high in propor- 

 tion to their size as a house a mile high would 

 be to that of a man. 



Some of these buildings have forty or fifty 

 stories, each containing many separate rooms, 

 connected by entries; the principal of which 

 communicate with other rooms under ground, 

 and are often carried to the distance of several 

 feet from the hill. 



