20 NATURAL FEATURES OF AFRICA- 



has been taught to make its own bed, to sit at table, to eat 

 with a knife and fork, and to pour out tea. M. Degrandpr^ 

 mentions one kept on board a French vessel, which lighted 

 and kept the oven at a due temperature, put in the bread at 

 a given signal, and even assisted in drawing the ropes. 

 There was a strong suspicion among the sailors that it 

 would have spoken, but for the fear of being put to 

 harder work. The baboons, again, are a Lirge, shapeless, 

 brutal species, ugly and disgusting in their appearance, yet 

 not without some kind of union and pohty. The monkey 

 tribe, now familiar in Europe, and attracting attention by 

 their playful movements, fill with sportive cries all the fo- 

 rests of tropical Africa. 



The insect race, which in our climate is generally harm- 

 less, presents here many singular and even formidable cha- 

 racteristics. The flying tribes, in particular, through the 

 action of the sun on the swampy forests, rise up in terrible 

 and destructive numbers. They fill the ait and darken the 

 sky; they annihilate the labour of nations ; they drive even 

 armies before them. The locust, when its bands issue in 

 close and dark array from the depths of the Desert, commits 

 ravaores surpassing those of the most ferocious wild beasts, 

 or even the more desolating career of human warfare. In 

 vain do the despairing inhabitants seek with fire and other 

 means to arrest their progress; the dense and irresistible 

 mass continues to move onward, and soon baffles every at- 

 tempt to check its course. Whole provinces, which at 

 at their entrance are covered with rich harvests and brilliant 

 verdure, are left without a leaf or a blade. Even when 

 destroyed by famine or tempest, they cover immense tracts, 

 exhaling the most noxious stench. Yet they may be used 

 as food, and are even relished by certain native tribes. 

 The mosquito and its allies do not spread such a fearful de- 

 solation ; yet by their poisoned and tormenting stings they 

 render life miserable, and ritflfrvery unfrequently lead 

 -extinction. Even a swarm of wild bees, in the 

 woods of Western Africa, has put a whole caravan to^ 

 wounding severely some of its members. But perhaps the 

 most extraordinary of all the insect races are the termites, 

 or white ants, whicii display on a greater scale the arts 

 and social organization for which their species have been 

 BO famed in Europe. Thev cover the plains with their 



id^Mts 

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