INSECTS 



the belief in aristocracy vindicated by the ancient and 

 honorable line of descent represented by the roaches and 

 flowering in the termites. 



One particular piece of evidence of the roach ancestry 

 of the termites is furnished by the wings. With most 

 termites the wings (Fig. 83) are not well developed, and 



Fig. 84. Wings of Mastotermes, the hind wing with a basal 



expansion similar to that of the hind wing of a roach (fig. 53), 



suggesting a relationship between termites and roaches 



their muscles are partly degenerate. In some forms, how- 

 ever, the wings (Fig. 84) are distinctly of the roach type 

 of structure (Fig. 53), and these forms are undoubtedly 

 more closely representative ot the ancestral termites than 

 are the species with the usual termite wing structure. 



Our termites and those of other temperate regions con- 

 stitute the mere fringes of termite civilization. The ter- 

 mites are particularly insects of warm climates, and it is 

 in the tropics that they find their most congenial environ- 

 ment and attain the full expression of their possibilities. 



In the tropics the characteristic termites are not those 

 that inhabit dead wood, but species that construct definite 

 and permanent nests, some placed beneath the ground, 



[146] 



