244 INDIRECT INJURIES CAUSED BY INSECTS. 



it, and had devoured most of the wood-work, leaving 

 little besides the metal and glasses 3 . A shorter pe- 

 riod sufficed for their demolition of some of Mr. Forbes's 

 furniture. On surveying a room which had been locked 

 up during an absence of a few weeks, he observed a 

 number of advanced works in various directions towards 

 some prints and drawings in English frames ; the glasses 

 appeared to be uncommonly dull, and the frames covered 

 with dust. " On attempting," says he, " to wipe it off, 

 I was astonished to find the glasses fixed to the wall, 

 not suspended in frames as I left them, but completely 

 surrounded by an incrustation cemented by the white 

 ants, who had actually eaten up the deal frames and 

 back-boards, and the greater part of the paper, and left 

 the glasses upheld by the incrustation, or covered way, 

 which they had formed during their depredation V It 

 is even asserted that the superb residence of the Go- 

 vernor-General at Calcutta, which cost the East India 

 Company such immense sums, is now rapidly going to 

 decay in consequence of the attacks of these insects c . — 

 But not content with the dominions they have acquir- 

 ed, and the cities they have laid low on Terra Firma, 

 encouraged by success the white ants have also aimed at 

 the sovereignty of the ocean, and once had the hardi- 

 hood to attack even a British ship of the line ; and, in 

 spite of the efforts of her commander and his valiant 

 erew, having boarded they got possession of her, and 

 handled her so roughly, that when brought into port, be- 



4 a This account of the Termites is chiefly taken from Smeathman 

 in Philos. Tram. 1781, and Percival's Ceylon, 307— . 



b Oriental Memoirs, i. 362. « Morning Herald, Dec. 31st, 181 4. 



