428 THE PARASITES OF THE TERMITES. 



swallowed living prey; that is to say, all or nearly all dead and in different stages 

 of digestion. Nevertheless, the proportion of materials which I had inferred to 

 be the ordinary food of the Termite was so very small in comparison with the 

 immense numbers of associated and incessantly present parasites, that I could not 

 avoid the suspicion that these might possibly be collected from among the decaying 

 wood in and on which the Termites were considered to live. An examination, 

 however, of the wood in which the Termites lived, and of the plastering of their 

 galleries, exhibited no traces of the parasites or of spores or eggs which could be 

 referred to the latter. 



Of the parasites of our Termite there appear to be three or four, or perhaps 

 more distinct species of remarkable protozoans, but of this I am not positive, for I 

 have suspected that several which I at first viewed as such may be only different 

 stages of the same. On the other hand, certain forms which I have regarded as 

 younger stages of species as I have distinguished them, may in future investigation 

 prove to be equally distinct. These parasites are widely different from any pre- 

 viously described of which I have any knowledge, and they have exceedingly 

 puzzled me as to their nearest relations. Their delicacy of structure, rapid move- 

 ments and variation in shape, and liability to change from more or less rapid 

 decomposition, render their characters intricate and difficult to unravel. In the 

 following descriptions I have of course attempted to represent them as they have 

 appeared to me from time to time, but I am not altogether satisfied with the results, 

 and apprehend that in some cases I have not interpreted the appearances correctly. 

 "With the peculiar parasites indicated there are several others which are of a 

 vegetal character, and these likewise are described in the following pages. 



Our Termite also is infested with a nematoid worm in an immature condition, 

 the Isacis migrans, discovered by M. Lesp^s, in the same state, in the Termes luci- 

 fugum of France, and likewise found by him in the mature condition in the earth 

 of the nest of the Termite. Further, a gregarine, so common in insects, is also 

 occasionally found in our Termite. 



Termites, or White-ants, are so common, easily obtained and preserved alive, 

 and their parasites are so exceedingly numerous, constant in their occurrence, and 

 curious, that once the fact becomes sufficiently known, the insects will become 

 favorite subjects to illustrate at once the infinity of life and the wonders that are 

 revealed by the microscope. The parasites were first observed by the writer in 

 1877, and a brief notice of them was published in the Proceedings of this Academy 

 for the same year. 



