The Lambertville record. [volume] (Lambertville, N.J.) 1872-1968, 1882-05-10
INSECTS IN INDIA.

You have recently arrived in the country,
are living in ktsteha house Quilt of sun
dried bricks and mud-mortar), have made
yourself comfortable therein, and are going
to have your FIRST dinner party All your
hnick-knacks are proudly displayed on your
table, and in its centre blazes your lamp
Just unpaclyed. The dinner hour approach
es, and you neryousiy take look around 10
see that all is right. One or two insects,
new to you, are fiuttering about the lamp or
on the table, and in brushing them off you
perhaps notice that the same insects are
swnrming out OF a corner or from the
floor. Your guests arrive; and while re-
ceiving and marshalling them in to dinner
the insect invasion has assumed formidable
proportion, SO that when you sit down to
soup, you lind the air around the lamp alive
with termites, and your fair cloth covered
with them. Every soup plate is stuffed with
them. as also your glasses of sherry. In
despair, you appeal to the company, or to
your table attendant, and are advised to re-
move the lamp at once from the table. On.
doing 50, the invaders ON the wing are di-
yerted; and then you notice that the thou
sands on the table have dropped their wings
broadcast, and are now chasing one another
about. In comparative darkness, you
finish your dinner, and adjourn to the draw
ing-room. When your guests have left,
curiosity takes you back to the dining-room;
and you find the table and the site of the
removed lamp strewn with myriads of WINGS
and their owners nowhere.
Watch the insects outside, aud the sight
is equally wonderful From a spot in tho
ground where you would least expect it, YOU
find one or two termites futterng into the
air; watch them narrowly, and you will find
minute hole, far too minute for the hordes
which are squeezing out of it and then rising
into the air. Around the hole half-a-dozen
wingless workers are fussing frantically.
But let US watch the perfect insects, and re-
turn afterward to the workers. Soon we
see pyramidal cloud of insects in the air,
the apex resting over the hole. This be-
comes denser and spreads wider as tho
breeze catches their wings. News of the
flight have been telegraphed far and wide.
Sparows and crows, fy-catchers and king
crows, kites and mynas, flock to the scene,
and gorge on the fliers. (Kites feast labor
iously every termite is individually seized
with the .alons, and then disposed Of by the
beak). If evening is setting in bats and
even frugivorous Aying-foxes join in the
reyel, and termites are devoured in myriads.
Turn again to the holo whence the last ter
mite has emerged, and you will find the
workers busily engaged in plastering il up
again, and destroying all traces of the flight.
The few survivors of the swarm seek the
earth, drop their wings, and disappear. The
dropping of the wings is marvellous pro-
cess two pair, with all their machinery of
bloodyessels, nerves, and ligaments, are in
simultaneously dispensed with, and the insect
seems liveler than before and this mutila-
ton occurs precisely at the exact moment
Seize termite by the wings at the wrong
moment, and he will struggle violently to es-
cape, the wings remaining firm in your
grass, sSeisasi ~ ,tl.esssiKtzt tnumant mud
you viii see it lift its body upward and back
ward like an earwig, deliberately unlock its
wings and so escape. Chambers Journal.