TERMITES (WHITE ANTS). 111 
History, 1883, a third species, Termes flavipes, found in Portugal and the south of 
France, was originally introduced from North Africa. 
Still more recently (1870), a very destructive species of White Ant, Hutermes 
tenuis, has been accidentally introduced into St. Helena with a captured slave ship 
from tropical America. Such were the ravages which this species committed on that 
Island, that in Jamestown, the capital, the larger number of the buildings were 
destroyed and had to be rebuilt, the damage to property being reckoned at 
the lowest estimate to amount to no less than £60,000. Some of the results of 
the destructive work of this termite are thus narrated by Mr. J. C. Melliss in his 
book “St. Helena,” 1875. “It was a melancholy sight five years ago, to see the 
town desolated as by an earthquake or, as a visitor remarked, by a state of siege— 
the chief church in ruins, public buildings in a state of dilapidation, and private 
houses tottering and falling, with great timber props butting out and meeting the 
the eye at every turn. Books and records in the library and Government offices 
were destroyed, and merchandise of every consumable description devoured in the 
warehouses.” Among other remarkable phenomena chronicled as having been brought 
about at Jamestown through this termite agency was the very singular spectacle of a 
large Margossa tree, Melia azederach, in full foliage, which, without any previous 
warning, and to the great discomforture of two native policemen who were 
standing near it, was seen to sway, totter, and suddenly fall to pieces. On exam- 
ination it was found that the inside of the tree was completely eaten away, 
leaving only a thin external shell. Hutermes tenuis agrees with the majority of the 
more destructive species in constructing no conspicuous nest or mound, but lives 
and breeds in subterranean chambers and galleries. 
It has been remarked on a previous page that the account and figures given 
by Henry Smeathman of the termitaria and habits of certain West African Termites 
so long ago as the year 1781, constitute up to the present date the most com- 
plete record extant concerning the tropical nest-building forms. As an indication 
of the good work in the same direction that awaits accomplishment with relation 
to the internal architectural details of the edifices, as well as the life phenomena and 
habits of the hitherto unstudied Australian species, Mr. Smeathman’s Memoir may 
be advantageously quoted at some length. Briefly summarising the results of Mr. 
Smeathman’s investigations, we find that they include the descriptions and figures of 
three nest-building Termites, and also a reference to a fourth variety, the Marching 
Termite, remarkable for the recorded circumstance that, unlike all other known 
