SWARMING OF THE WHITE ANTS 121 



look as they went about making frantic efforts to 

 swallow the insects' wings. 



If these lizards had possessed a little knowledge of 

 natural history they would have deserted the walls and 

 made merry on the ground among the termites that 

 had already shed their wings. But perhaps it was as 

 well for them that they did not, for had they been 

 able to devour a whole white ant at a gulp many 

 of them would, ere this, have suffered the sad fate of 

 the King of England who partook too plentifully of 

 lampreys. 



By this morning all the white ants had disappeared 

 as mysteriously as they came. Nothing of them was 

 left, save a few hundred thousand wings. What has 

 become of the owners of these wings? Many were 

 devoured by lizards; some fell victims to other enemies; 

 a few have lost their wings and apparently their way, 

 for they are crawling aimlessly about and are being 

 rapidly appropriated by the black ants, which are 

 careering along excitedly, looking at each wing they 

 pass, to see if perchance it have not a fine succulent 

 white ant attached to it. When the black ant does 

 alight upon a termite he seizes it with his powerful 

 jaws and bears it off in triumph to the nest. But what 

 has happened to the termites which have not been 

 devoured? Surely all have not perished? These are 

 questions to which it is not easy to give a satisfactory 

 answer. 



As every one knows, termites are not ants ; they are 

 totally different insects. They resemble ants only in 

 that they are social organisms that live in colonies, of 



