INSECTA—TERMITES. 839 
of aisles in perspective, and are soon lost among the innumerable cham- 
bers and nurseries behind them. 
“All these chambers, and the passages leading to and from them, being 
arched, they help to support one another ; and while the interior large arches 
prevent them falling into the centre, and keep the area open, the exterior 
building supports them on the outside. 
“‘T have observed before, that there are of every species of termites tnree 
orders. Of these, the working insects, or laborers, are always the most nu- 
merous. In the termites bellicosus, there seem to be at least one hundred 
laborers to one of the fighting insects or soldiers. The laborers are about 
one fourth of an inch long, and twenty-five of them weigh about a grain; 
so that they are not so large as some of our ants. From their external habit 
and fondness for wood, they have been very expressively called wood lice. 
They resemble them, it is true, very much at a distance ; but they run faster 
than any other insects of their size, and are incessantly bustling about their 
affairs. 
“ The second order, or soldiers, have a very different form from the labor- 
ers, and have been by some authors supposed to be the males, and the former 
neuters: but they are, in fact, the same insects as the foregoing, only they 
have undergone a change of form, and approach one degree nearer to the 
perfect state. They are now much larger, being half an inch long, and equal 
in bulk to fifteen of the laborers. 
“There is now, likewise, a most remarkable circumstance in the form of 
the head and mouth; for in the former state, the mouth is evidently calcu- 
lated for gnawing and holding bodies ; but in this state, the jaws being shaped 
just like two very sharp awls a little jagged, they are incapable of any thing 
but piercing or wounding, for which purposes they are very effectual, being 

as hard as a crab’s claw, and placed in a strong, horny head, which is of a 
nut-brown color, and larger than all the rest of the body together, which 
seems to labor under great difficulty in carrying it: on which account, per- 
naps, the animal is incapable of climbing up perpendicular surfaces. 
“The third order, or the insect in its perfect state, varies its form still 
more than ever. The head, thorax, and abdomen, differ almost entirely from 
the same parts in the laborers and soldiers ; and, besides this, the animal is 
now furnished with four large, brownish, transparent wings, with which it1s 
at the time of emigration to wing its way in search of a new settlement. 
