TERMITES 



show something of interest concerning them. In the 

 first place, it is to be seen that not all the members of the 

 colony are alike. Some, usually the greater number, are 

 small, ordinary, soft-bodied, wingless insects with rounded 

 heads and inconspicuous jaws (Figs. 75 D, 77 A). Others, 

 less numerous, have bodies like the first, and are also 

 wingless, but their heads are relatively of enormous size 

 and support a pair of large, strong jaws projecting out 

 in front (Figs. 75 C, 77 B). The individuals of the latter 

 kind are known as soldiers, and the name is not entirely 

 fanciful, since fighting is not necessarily the everyday 

 occupation of one in military service. The others, the 

 small-headed individuals, are called workers, and they 

 earn their title literally, for, even with their small jaws, 

 they do most of the work of excavating the tunnels, and 

 they perform whatever other labors are to be done within 

 the nest. 



Both the workers and the soldiers are males and females, 

 but so far as reproductive powers go, they may be called 

 "neuters," since their reproductive organs never mature 

 and they take no part in the replenishment of the colony. 

 In most species of termites the workers and the soldiers 

 are blind, having no eyes or but rudiments of eyes. In 

 a few of the more primitive termite genera, workers are 

 absent, and in the higher genera they may be of two 

 types of structure. The large jaws of the soldiers (Fig. 

 78 A) are weapons of defense in some species, and the 

 soldiers are said to present themselves at any break in the 

 walls of the nest ready to defend the colony against in- 

 vasion. In some species, the soldiers have a long tubular 

 horn projecting forward from the face (Fig. 78 B), through 

 which opens the duct of a gland that emits a sticky, 

 semiliquid substance. This glue is discharged upon an 

 attacking enemy, who is generally an ant, and so thor- 

 oughly gums him up that he is rendered helpless — a 

 means of combat yet to be adopted in human warfare. 

 The facial gland is developed to such efficiency as a 



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