60 
SANTAREM. 
Chap. L 
stone ; others are smaller, and constructed in a looser 
manner. The ground is everywhere streaked with the 
narrow covered galleries which are built up by the 
insects of grains of earth different in colour from the 
surrounding soil, to protect themselves whilst convey- 
ing materials wherewith to build their cities — for such 
the tumuli may be considered — or carrying their young 
from one hillock to another. The same covered ways 
are spread over all the dead timber, and about the 
decaying roots of herbage, which serve as food to the 
white ants. An examination of these tubular passages 
or arcades in any part of the district, or a peep into 
one of the tumuli, reveals always a throng of eager, 
busy creatures. I became very much interested in 
these insects while staying at Santarem, where many 
circumstances favoured the study of their habits, and 
examined several hundred colonies in endeavouring to 
clear up obscure points in their natural history. Very 
little, up to that date, had been recorded of the con- 
stitution and economy of their communities, owing 
doubtless to their not being found in northern and 
central Europe, and, therefore, not within reach of 
European observers. I will give a short summary of 
my observations, and with this we shall have done with 
Santarem and its neighbourhood.* 
White ants are small, pale-coloured, soft-bodied in- 
sects, having scarcely anything in common with true 
* My original notes on the Termites, comprising all details, were 
sent to Professor Westwood (Oxford) in 1854 and 1855 ; they were not 
printed in England, but have been translated into German, and pub- 
lished by Dr. Hagen, with his monograph of the family, in the Limifea 
Entomologica, 12 Band, Stettin, 1858, p. 207, ff. 
