498 
WHITE ANTS. 
peristaltic motion, which resembles the undulating 
of waves, and continues incessantly, without any 
apparent effort of the animal ; so that one part or 
other is alternately rising and sinking in perpetual 
succession, and the matrix seems never at rest, but 
is always protruding eggs, to the amount (as I 
have frequently counted in old queens) of sixty in 
a minute, or eighty thousand and upwards in one 
day of twenty-four hours. These eggs are instantly 
taken from her body by her attendants (of whom 
there always are, in the royal chambers and gal- 
leries adjacent, a sufficient number in waiting) and 
carried to the nurseries, which in a great nest may 
some of them be four or five feet distant in a 
straight line, and consequently much further by 
their winding galleries. Here, after they are hatch- 
ed, the young are attended, and provided with every 
thing necessary until they are able to shift for them- 
selves, and take their share of the labours of the 
community. The foregoing, I flatter myself, is an 
accurate description and account of the Termes belli- 
cosus, or species that builds the large nests in its dif- 
ferent states. 
“ The termites, except their heads, are exceeding 
soft, and covered with a thin and delicate skin; 
being blind, they are no match on open ground 
for the ants, who can see, and are all of them co- 
vered with a strong horny shell not easily pierced, 
and are of dispositions bold, active, and rapacious. 
Whenever the termites are dislodged from their 
covered ways, the various species of the former, who 
