THE COASTS OF SAINTONGE. 357 



to recommence from time to time a fresh course of 

 experiments and operations. But we may ask if the 

 farmer succeeds in freeing himself in one season 

 from noxious weeds and tares. He, too, requires 

 activity and perseverance to protect his harvests ; 

 and this is all we ask of the proprietors of the houses 

 or lands which are being undermined by the Ter- 

 mites, and at this cost alone can we guarantee them 

 success in their endeavours. 



Since the publication of the original edition of this 

 work, a very careful series of observations has been 

 instituted by M. Lespes on the Termes lucifuyus of 

 Bordeaux. We learn from these observations, which 

 were begun in the autumn of 1855 and continued 

 through the greater part of the year 1856, that M. 

 Lespes concurs in the opinion already expressed in 

 the preceding pages, that this species differs from the 

 one found at La Rochelle, the latter having pro- 

 bably been imported from tropical regions. Among 

 many other reasons that may be advanced in support 

 of this view, he instances the fact that the damage 

 effected by the Bordeaux Termites is very trifling 

 when compared with the injuries inflicted by their 

 congeners in the department of the Charente. 

 Hitherto the T. lucifuyus of Bordeaux has mainly 

 limited its ravages to the old and decaying pine- 

 stumps, which remain after each year's felling of 

 timber in the Landes of Bordeaux ; but it is not im- 



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