ME. G. D. HAVILAND ON TEEMITES. 369 



SO, but moisten the pellets of clay which they bring with fluid 

 from their mouths. In species of Coptotermes and Rhinotermes, 

 and in Termes tenuior, I did not see what manner of cement was 

 used. T. planus lived in shallow chambers eaten in the w^ood, 

 much after the manner of Calotermes^ and had no buildings. 



Observers in America and Europe have concluded that the 

 same colony often possesses several nests, only one of which is 

 inhabited by fertile individuals, whose eggs and young are carried 

 to the other nests. I do not doubt that this is so with a few 

 species ; I believe it to be so with T. Gesfroi ; nevertheless it is 

 not so with the great majority of species which I have collected. 

 Further, the evidence for such conclusion is, for the most part, 

 negative, and therefore to be treated with great caution. As 

 the search for king and queen goes on hour after hour without 

 success, exhausted patience induces strong wish for a conclusion; 

 and it is then that the difficulty arises of keeping the influence 

 of wish from upsetting the even balance of judgment. 



Family TEEMITID^. 



The Termitidse, commonly known as White Ants, are insects 

 feeding on wood and dead vegetable matter, living socially in 

 colonies of sterile and fertile individuals, which grow very slowly 

 and have no pupa-stage. Antennae situated in a shallow fossa 

 at the side of the head just above the base of the mandibles. 

 Mandibles powerful, except in the soldiers of some species. 

 Maxillae with double chitinous hooks and long 5-segmented 

 palpi. Head hinged to the prothorax by means of a pair of 

 lateral cervical sclerites. Tarsi of 4 segments, the distal as long 

 as the three proximal together. Pronotum, raesonotum, and 

 metanotum distinct. Abdomen of 10 segments ; the ventral 

 plate of the basal segment absent; that of the apical segment 

 divided, and bearing at the lateral ends a pair of short cerci ; 

 that of the 9th segment in the larva, and often in the adult, with 

 a pair of small papillae near the centre of its posterior border. 



Males with a pair of compound eyes placed just above the 

 antennal fossae, and for the most part a pair of ocelli situated 

 near their inner borders. Frequently there is a median fenestra. 

 When young there are two pairs of large, membranous, nearly 

 equal wings, which in rest are superposed and project far beyond 

 the apex of the abdomen ; these wings are used in flying from 



