WHITE ANTS, or Termites, literally build a cell round the great progenitrix of the community, and feed her through apertures. Whenever build. ings are infested with the destructive white ants, their nests containing the queen ant will always be found in the immediate neighbourhood ; and as the destruction of the queen ant destroys the colony, there is no reason why any building should suffer from this destructive insect ; and instruc tions are now given generally for digging up the white ants' nests in the neighbourhood of rill public buildings. As a royal cell not unfrequently contains two, and sometimes three queens, and several royal cells, containing one or more queens, may frequently be found in the same nest, the g-round should be excavated until the entire destruction of the nest has placed the destruction of all the queens beyond doubt. Vegetable wax has been found efficient in checking the approach of the white ants. Cultivators of sugar-cane know how destructive are the ravages of these insects, and the following is said to be au effica cious, though rather tedious remedy ;— Asafceticla (hing), 8 ehittak ; mustard seed cake (Surson ki-khulli), 8 seers ; putrid fish, 4 seers ; bruised butch root, 2 seers ; muddur, 2 seers. Mix together in a large vessel with water sufficient to make them into the thickness of curd ; then steep each slip of cane in it for half an hour before planting ; and, lastly, water the lines three times previous to setting the cane, by irrigating the water-course with water mixed up with bruised hutch root, or muddur, if the former be not pro curable. 1Vhite ants can be completely extirpated from a cane plantation by manuring the soil well with inustard cake, and stirring it up constantly.
A mixture of quicklime, soap, aud tar, smeared where the white ants appear, puts an effectual stop to their inroads. Tar, turpentine, kerosene oil, earth oil, and margosa oil are also valuable ; wood-ashes also are of value, sprinkled about the orifices of the dwellings, and smoking thein Out with wet straw ; the Acorns calainux, steeped in water, is said t,o be of use. Sarcostemma acidum is employed in the west of India to destroy them. The l'oona Observer states that tobacco decoction was applied to a piece of ground where for eleven years the white ants had destroyed everything put down ; their removal was most effectually secured by the sprinkling of the decoction. Solutions of salts, ashes, and quicklime prove temporarily efficacious ; and if dry ashes be put into an ant hill, and hot water poured in, the ants will be killed.
In existing buildings, auger holes from the top of the beams near the walls rnay be bored, and fish oil or the earth oil (naphtha) poured in, and allowed. to find its way into the wood. In short, a
process similar to creosoting extemporized. Fish oil is effectual, and is more readily diffused through the wood.
A coating of tar, creosoting, and impregnation with dilute sulphate of copper, by means of Boucherie's apparatus, appear effectually to pre serve timber and other substances from the attacks of white ants.
Few timbers (unless they have gone through sonic creosoting or kyanizing operation) can be said to be quite impervious to the attacks of white ants. The wood of the Strychnos nux vornica is, however, quite proof against them, probably owing to the very bitter properties of the timber. The sal or Shorea robusta, also, as far as lias been observed, quite withstands their attacks. The harder timbers of India, such as the iron-wood or inesua, the Soymida febrifuga, and the acha or Hardwickia binata, are the least susceptible of injury by this insect. The timbers which have proved least susceptible of injury by white ants are teak, pedouk, Trincomalee, and rose.
Like a species of the ant that secretes formic acid, so the white ant secretes termic acid, with which it softens aud moulds the soil it excavates from the earth to build its mounds and nests. To the former it gives solidity when hardened by time ; to the nest itself it gives some elasticity and a corrugated leathery appearance when inoist or recently excavated. Should the nest be freely handled, it causes some irritation, and stains the fingers slightly. Owing to this acid property, the white ant earth is in use as an embrocation when applied to sprains or bruises in native medicine. In native veterinary practice, it is in general use for such purposes, when boiled with an equal portion of cow-dung and applied warm to the swollen part, under the name of Leep.
Kirby and Spence (Introduction to Entornolou, p. 312) say of the Termes lucifugus, a variety of the white ant, These insects seem to be furnished with 1111 acid of a very penetrating odour, which is perhaps useful to them for softening the wood.' This odour to a moderate extent exists in the fresh excavated nest of the common white ant or Termitidw.
The frosted appearance of glassware covered with tho mud of the white ant, is caused. by the acid secreted by this insect, which Dr. Shortt ntuned terrnic acid, in an essay submitted to the St Helena Government through the 3Iadras Go vernment,in.1862 or 1883, when the St. Helena Government had offered a prize for the detection and destruction of white ants in that colony, which was said to cause much destruction to houses slid property.—Mr. Simpkins; Mr. Rohde; Mr. Smart; Col. Simpson ; Dr. Hunter ; Captain It. IL Bed dome; Captain Da»gerfield ; Col. T. IL Campbell, in Proceedings, Madras Military Board ; Poona Observer ; Dr. &writ.