These curious and wonderful insects are found both in India and Africa.
They are of several species, one or two of which construct works
surpassing in skill those even of the bee and beaver, and comparatively
of far greater size for them, than the boasted pyramids of the ancients
are for man. The laborers employed among them in these works, are not a
quarter of an inch in length; and yet the structures they rear rise to
the hight of ten or even twelve feet above the surface of the earth, and
in their interior construction and various arrangements, exceed even the
works of man himself. The most striking parts of these structures are
the royal apartments, the nurseries, magazines of provisions, the arched
chambers and galleries, with their various communications; the ranges of
the Gothic-shaped arches, projected, and not formed by mere excavation,
some of which are two or three feet high, but which diminish rapidly,
like the arches of aisles in perspective; the various roads, sloping
staircases, and bridges consisting of one vast arch, constructed to
shorten the distance between the several parts of the building, which
would otherwise be connected only by winding passages. In the following
engraving may be seen, on the right, one of the ant-hills as it appears
_externally_; and on the left, a _section_ of one of them, surmounted by
its conical roof. In some parts of Senegal, the number, magnitude and
closeness of these structures make them appear like the villages of the
natives; and their strength is such, that when they have been raised to
about half their hight, the wild bulls of the country stand on them, as
sentinels, while the rest of the herd are feeding below. When at their
full hight of ten or twelve feet, they are used by Europeans as look-out
stations, whence they can see over the grass, which in Africa is, on an
average, of the hight of thirteen feet. Four or five persons may stand
on the top of one of these buildings, to look out for a vessel the
approach of which may be expected.
[Illustration: ANT-HILLS OF THE WHITE ANT.]
The termites themselves are divided into three distinct ranks, or
orders, viz., the laborers, or working insects; the soldiers, or the
fighting order, who avoid all labor, and are about twice as long as the
laborers, and nearly fifteen times their bulk; and lastly, the winged or
perfect insects, which may be styled the nobility or gentry, who neither
fight nor work, and from whom come the kings and queens of the
establishment.
These insects are extremely destructive; and it is said that a deserted
town has been known to be utterly destroyed by them in two or three
years, so that not a vestige of it remained. At Bombay, in a few hours,
they will demolish a large chest of books, papers, silks, or clothes,
perforating them with a thousand holes; and they sometimes penetrate and
eat up the timbers and boards of houses, and in the same manner destroy
the timbers of a ship. The only way to preserve anything from their
depredations, when they are in a neighborhood, is to put it on a
platform resting on glass bottles, which, if kept free from dust, they
can not ascend.
[Illustration: HUTS IN KAMTSCHATKA.]