200 THE WORLD'S LUMBER ROOM. 



established themselves in La Rochelle, where, besides doing 

 other damage, they have eaten up the 

 whole of the town archives, with the 

 exception of the topmost sheet, under 

 cover of which they pursued their destruc- 

 tive labours without attracting attention. 



In America, where it is no uncommon 

 thing to find wood-built towns and villages, 

 once populous, suddenly, for one reason 

 or another, abandoned and left to decay, 

 the termites will come and take possession 

 and completely clear the ground, doing 

 their work, too, so thoroughly that not a 

 door-post or a trace of one will be left, 

 unless it happens to have been of teak or 

 iron-wood. They will work, moreover, 

 with such amazing rapidity, that in two 

 or three years from the time of their arrival, 

 the site of the town will be covered with 

 a thick growth of vegetation. 



In hot countries, however, Nature has 

 a wonderful number of other labourers 

 employed in the work of removing dead 

 vegetable matter, though the termites are 

 certainly the most expeditious of any. 



What they are on land, that the 

 Teredo (Fig. 40) is in the ocean, which, 

 Fig. 40. THE SHIP but f or t h e labours of this creature, would 



WORM ( Teredo 



navaiis.} be choked, in spite of its vastness, by the 



Ir.r^e quantities of timber, to say nothing of wrecks, which 



