142 INDIRECT INJURIES CAUSED BY INSECTS. 



devoured most of the wood-work, leaving little besides the metal and 

 glasses. 1 A shorter period sufficed for their demolition of some of 

 Mr. Forbes's furniture. On surveying a room which had been locked up 

 during an absence of a few weeks, he observed a number of advanced 

 works in various directions towards some prints and drawings in English 

 frames; the glasses appeared to be uncommonly dull, and the frames 

 covered with dust. "On attempting," says he, "to wipe it off, I was 

 astonished to find the glasses fixed to the wall, not suspended in frames as 

 I left them, but completely surrounded by an incrustation cemented by the 

 white ants, who had actually eaten up the deal frames and back-boards, 

 and the greater part of the paper, and left the glasses upheld by the 

 incrustation or covered way, which they had formed during their depreda- 

 tion." 2 It is even asserted that the superb residence of the Governor- 

 General at Calcutta, which cost the East India Company such immense 

 sums, is now rapidly going to decay in consequence of the attacks of 

 these insects. 3 But not content with the dominions they have acquired, 

 and the cities they have laid low on Terra Firma, encouraged by success, 

 the white ants have also aimed at the sovereignty of the ocean, and once 

 had the hardihood to attack even a British ship of the line ; and in spite 

 of the efforts of her commander and his valiant crew, having boarded they 

 got possession of her, and handled her so roughly, that when brought into 

 port, being no longer fit for service, she was obliged to be broken up. 4 



And here, I think, I see you throw aside my papers, and hear you ex- 

 claim "Will this enumeration of scourges, plagues, and torments never 

 be finished ? Was the whole insect race created merely with punitive 

 views, and to mar the fair face of universal nature ? Are they all, as our 

 Saviour said figuratively of one genus, the scorpion, the powerful agents 

 and instruments of the great enemy of mankind? " 5 If you view the subject 

 in another light, you will soon, my friend, be convinced that, instead of 

 this, insects generally answer the most beneficial ends, and promote in 

 various ways, and in an extraordinary degree, the welfare of man and 

 animals; and that the series of the evils I have been engaged in enume- 

 rating mostly occur partially, and where they exceed their natural limits ; 

 God permitting this occasionally to take place, not merely with punitive 

 views, but also to show us what mighty effects he can produce by instru- 

 ments seemingly the most insignificant ; thus calling upon us to glorify his 

 power, wisdom, and goodness, so evidently manifested whether he relaxes 

 or draws tight the reins by which he guides insects in their course, and 

 regulates their progress ; and more particularly to acknowledge his over- 

 ruling Providence so conspicuously exhibited by his measuring them, as it 



1 This account of the Termites is chiefly taken from Smeathman in Philos. Trans. 

 1781, and Percival's Ceylon, 307. 



2 Oriental Memoirs, i. 362. 



3 Morning Herald, Dec. 31st, 1814. 



* The ship here alluded to was the Albion, which was in such a condition from the 

 attack of insects, supposed to be white ants, that had not the ship been firmly 

 lashed together, it was thought she would have foundered on her voyage home. 

 The late Mr. Kittoe informed me that the Droguers or Draguers, a kind of lighter 

 employed in the West Indies in collecting the sugar, sometimes so swarm with ants, 

 of the common kind, that they have no other way of getting rid of these troublesome 

 insects than by sinking the vessel in shallow water. 



8 Luke, x. 19. 



