THE WEB OF LIFE 337 



vegetation, they began to hear a curious rustling noise 

 which at first suggested the presence of a cobra. Advanc- 

 ing carefully they found no hint of any snake, but traced 

 the sound to a colony of Termes ohscuriceps which had 

 formed its galleries on the large fallen leaves of a Bread 

 Tree (Artocarpus). The sound was caused by the Termites 

 striking the under-surface of the dry leaves. On another 

 occasion about a hundred Termites took possession of 

 a Kttle desk in Bugnion's office, and they used to answer 

 back to knocks from without. 



What is it that happens ? Prof. H. von Buttel-Keepen 

 helped Bugnion ia the inquiry, and showed what one has 

 to do to make the white ants signal — ' pour faire parler 

 les Termites '. Part of a termitary is placed on a platter 

 and covered with a sheet of strong, firm paper. The 

 soldier Termites collect on the under-side of the paper 

 and answer back to every signal. Whenever the paper 

 vibrates they strike it repeatedly with their mandibles 

 or with their chin (the basal piece of the third pair of 

 mouth-appendages, which is exaggerated and hard in 

 the soldiers). What happens in nature is that dry leaves 

 or the hke, struck by repeated blows, repercussate hke 

 resonatiag plates. The thin wooden partitions in the 

 interior of the termitary will also have the same capacity 

 of transmitting vibrations. It seems that the sound pro- 

 duced difiers considerably in different species. To different 

 audiences it suggested the hiss of a snake, a crackhng, a 

 rattling, and the far-off chirping of a cricket. It is charac- 

 teristic of soldiers of the genus Termes and is always due 

 to minute blows on a resonating surface. It is well illus- 

 trated by the Indian Termes estherw (the same as Konig's 

 Hodotermes convulsionarius), which makes long horizontal 



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