120 BLUEFIELDS. 



Yellow-bellied Parroquet {Conurus flav'wenter) chooses 

 to build her nest in them, excavating a chamber 

 with her powerful beak. Snakes and their eggs are 

 often found in them, and the eggs of Lizards also. 

 I once found in one several eggs of the small 

 Pallette-tip Gecko {Sphceriodactylus argus). It is 

 now an excellent fuel, burning readily, with a flame 

 and a glowing brightness, little inferior to coal. As 

 no ammoniacal smell proceeds from it, and as it con- 

 sumes into a clear white ash, I conjecture that the 

 substance is of vegetable origin. It is sought after, 

 in those districts and seasons in which the Musqui- 

 toes make a more than endurable pest, in order to be 

 burned in a chafing-dish ; as it gives out a good deal 

 of smoke, which is the only weapon that those 

 formidable, though minute, warriors fear. The 

 smoke clears the house of the insect-hosts in a few 

 seconds ; and is much preferable to that of wood, 

 because far less painful to the eyes. 



The Termites do not often enter dwelling-houses ; 

 but sometimes they do penetrate the floors, and 

 devour whatever lies in their way, encrusting the 

 residue with their galleries, which they invariably 

 make as they go along. Some spare bedding that 

 had lain in one corner of my bed-room for some 

 weeks, tied up in a blanket, I found, on removing 

 it, much injured in this vvay; the blanket being 

 devoured in long meandering lines, and so defiled 

 with the crustaceous deposit as to be irreparably 

 spoiled. 



In the spring a swarm of the winged males and 

 females often enters the house, to the great annoy- 



