ORDER VIII. NEUROPTERA.— THE TERMITES. Bile 
projected, and not formed by mere excavation, some of which are two or 
three feet high, but which diminish rapidly, like the arches of aisles in per- 
spectives ; the various roads, sloping staircases, and bridges, consisting of 
one vast arch, and constructed to shorten the distance between the several 
parts of the building, 
passages. In some parts near Senegal, the number, magnitude, and close- 
which would otherwise communicate only by winding 
ness of these structures make them appear like the villages of the natives. 
Authors relate many extraordinary particulars in regard to the great devas- 
tations wrought by this powerful community, which constructs covered roads, 
diverging in all directions from the nest, and leading to every object of 
plunder within their reach. 
These destructive animals advance by myriads to their work under an 
arched incrustation of fine sand, tempered with a moisture from their body, 
which renders the covered way as hard as burnt clay, and effectually conceals 
them in their insidious employment. 
Mr. Forbes, on his departure from his residence at Anjengo, to pass a 
few weeks at a country retirement, locked up a room containing books, 
drawings, and a few valuables; as he took the key with him, the servant 
could not enter to clean the furniture; the walls of the room were white- 
yashed, and adorned with prints and drawings in English frames and glasses : 
returning home in the evening, and taking a cursory view of his cottage by 
candle-light, he found everything in apparently the same order as he had left 
it; but on a nearer inspection the next morning, he observed a number of 
advanced works, in various directions, towards his pictures; the glasses 
appeared to be uncommonly dull, and the frames covered with dust: on 
attempting to wipe it off, he was astonished to find the glasses fixed to the 
wall, not suspended in frames as he had left them, but completely surrounded 
by an incrustation cemented by the White Ants, who had actually eaten up 
the deal frames and back-boards, and the greater part of the paper, and left 
the glasses upheld by the incrustation, or covered way, which they had formed 
during their depredation. From the flat Dutch bottles, on which the draw- 
ers and boxes were placed, not having been wiped during his absence, the 
ants had ascended the bottles by means of the dust, eaten through the bot- 
tom of a chest, and made some progress in perforating the books and linen, 
The different functions of the laborers and soldiers, or the civil and mili- 
tary establishments, in a community of White Ants, are illustrated by Mr. 
Smeathman, in an attempt to examine their nest or city. On making a 
breach in any part of this structure with a hoe or pickaxe, a soldier imme- 
diately appears, and walks about the breach, as if to see whether the enemy 
is gone, or to examine whence the attack proceeds. In a short time he is 
followed by two or three others, and soon afterwards by a numerous body, who 
