samouelle's 



above alluded to, who mistook them for a different 

 kind of larvae. 



"3. The neuters, erroneously called by Sraeath- 

 man pupa?. These are much less numerous than 

 tin' workers, bearing the proportion of one to one 

 hundred, and exceeding them greatly in bulk. They 

 are also distinguishable by their long and large head, 

 armed with very long and subulate mandibles. Their 

 office is that of sentinels ; and when the nest is at- 

 tacked, to them is committed the task of defending 

 it. These neuters arc quite unlike those in the Hij- 

 menoptera perfect societies, which seem to be a kind 

 of abortive females, and there is nothing analogous 

 to them in any other department of Entomology. 



"4. and 5. Males and females, or the insects ar- 

 rived at their state of perfection, and capable of con- 

 tinuing the species. There is only one of each in 

 every separate society ; they are exempted from all 

 participation in the labours and employments occu- 

 pying the rest of the community, that they may be 

 wholly devoted to the furnishing of constant acces- 

 sions to the population of the colony. Though at 

 their first disclosure from the pupa they have four 

 wings, like the female ants they soon cast them ; 

 but they may then be distinguished from the blind 

 larvae, pupae, and neuters, by their large and pro- 

 minent eyes. 



" The first establishment of a colony of Termites 

 takes place in the following manner. In the even- 

 ing, soon after the first tornado, which at the latter 

 end of the dry season proclaims the approach of the 

 ensuing rains, these animals, having attained to their 

 perfect state, in which they are furnished and 

 adorned with two pair of wings, emerge from their 

 clay-built citadels by myriads and myriads, to seek 



