WHITE ANT. 479 



the body of the queen or breeding animal. The abdomen of this 

 female, in the termes bellicosus especially, begins gradually to 

 extend and enlarge to such an enormous size, that an old queen 

 Avill have it increased so as to be fifteen hundred, or two thousand 

 times the bulk of the rest of her body; and twenty or thirty- 

 thousand times the bulk of a labourer. Mr. Smeethman conjec- 

 tures the animal is upwards of two years old, when the abdomen is 

 increased to three inches in length ; and has sometimes found them 

 of near twice that size. The abdomen is now of an irregular 

 oblong shape, being contracted by the muscles of every segment, 

 and is become one vast matrix full of eggs, which make long cir- 

 cumvolutions through an innumerable quantity of very minute 

 vessels, that circulate round the inside in a serpentine manner, 

 which would exercise the ingenuity of a skilful anatomist to dis- 

 sect and develop. This singular matrix is not more remarkable 

 for its amazing extension and size, than for its peristalic motion, 

 which resembles the undulating of waves, and continues inces- 

 santly without any apparent effort of the animal ; so that one part 

 or other alternately is rising and 'sinking in perpetual succession, 

 and the matrix seems never at rest, but is always protruding eggs 

 to the amount of sixty in a minute ; or eighty thousand and up- 

 ward in one day of twenty-four hour*. These eggs are instantly- 

 taken from her body by her attendants (of whom there are always, 

 in the royal chamber, and the galleries adjacent, a sufficient num- 

 ber in waiting) and carried to the nurseries, which in a great nest 

 may some of them be four or five feet distant in a straight line, 

 and consequently much farther by their winding galleries. Here, 

 after they are hatched, the young are attended and provided with 

 every thing necessary, until they are able to shift for themselves, 

 and take their share of labour. 



iDerham. Phil, Trans . Gregory, 



