86 



The Study of Animal Life 



and as white as a bolster." But have some admiration for 

 her : she sometimes lays 60 eggs per minute, or 80,000 

 in a day, and continues reproducing for months. As she 

 lays, she is assiduously fed by the nursing-workers, while the 

 eggs are carried off to be hatched in the nurseries. At the 

 breeding season, numerous winged males and females leave 



1 I JjinV, 



Fig. 18. — Diagrammatic section of a termite's nest (after Houssay). In the walls 

 there arc winding passages (/) ; uppermost is a well-aired empty attic (D) 

 the next story (C) is a nursery where the young termites are hatched on 

 shelves (a) and (/') ; the next is a hall (B) supported hy pillars ; beneath this 

 is a royal chamber (?-) in which the king and queen are imprisoned ; around 

 this the chambers of worker-termites (i) and some store-chambers (;//) ; 

 excavated in the ground arc holes (c) out of which the material used in 

 making the termitary was dug. The whole structure is sometimes 10-15 

 feet in height. 



the hill and its workers in swarms, most of them simply to 

 die, others to mate with individuals from another hill and 

 to begin to form new colonies. 



The plot of the story becomes more intricate, however, 

 when we notice Fritz Miiller's observations, that " besides 



