488 
WHITE ANTS. 
and are soon lost among the innumerable chambers 
and nurseries behind them. All these chambers, 
and the passages leading to and from them, being 
arched, they help to support one another; and 
while the interior large arches prevent them falling 
into the centre, and keep the area open, the ex- 
terior building supports them on the outside. There 
are, comparatively speaking, few openings into the 
great area, and they, for the most part, seem in- 
tended only to admit that genial warmth into the 
nurseries which the dome collects. 
“ The interior building or assemblage of nurse- 
ries, chambers, &c., has a flattish top or roof with- 
out any perforation, which would keep the apart- 
ments below dry, in case through accident the dome 
should receive any injury and let in water; and it 
is never exactly flat and uniform, because they are 
always adding to it by building more chambers and 
nurseries : so that the divisions or columns between 
the future arched apartments resemble the pinnacles 
upon the fronts of some old buildings, and demand 
particular notice, as affording one proof that for the 
most part the insects project their arches, and do 
not make them, as I imagined for a long time, by 
excavation. 
“ The area has also a flattish floor, which lies 
over the royal chamber, but sometimes a good height 
above it, having nurseries and magazines between, 
1 1 is likewise water proof, and contrived, as far as I 
could guess, to let the water off, if it should get in, 
and run over by some short way into the subter- 
