The Ant-lion.—­Of the ant-lion, whose larvae have earned a bad renown from their predaceous ingenuity, Ceylon has, at least, four species, which seem peculiar to the island.[1] This singular creature, preparatory to its pupal transformation, contrives to excavate a conical pitfall in the dust to the depth of about an inch, in the bottom of which it conceals itself, exposing only its open mandibles above the surface; and here every ant and soft-bodied insect which, curiosity tempts to descend, or accident may precipitate into the trap, is ruthlessly seized and devoured by its ambushed inhabitant.

[Footnote 1:  Palpares contrarius, Walker; Myrmeleon gravis, Walker; M. dirus, Walker; M. barbarus, Walker.]

The White Ant—­But of the insects of this order the most noted are the white ants or termites (which are ants only by a misnomer).  They are, unfortunately, at once ubiquitous and innumerable in every spot where the climate is not too chilly, or the soil too sandy, for them to construct their domed edifices.

These they raise from a considerable depth under ground, excavating the clay with their mandibles, and moistening it with tenacious saliva[1] until it assume the appearance, and almost the consistency, of sandstone.  So delicate is the trituration to which they subject this material, that the goldsmiths of Ceylon employ the powdered clay of the ant hills in preference to all other substances in the preparation of crucibles and moulds for their finer castings; and KNOX says, in his time, “the people used this clay to make their earthen gods of, it is so pure and fine."[2] These structures the termites erect with such perseverance and durability that they frequently rise to the height of ten or twelve feet from the ground, with a corresponding diameter.  They are so firm in their texture that the weight of a horse makes no apparent indentation on their solidity; and even the intense rains of the monsoon, which no cement or mortar can long resist, fail to penetrate the surface or substance of an ant hill.[3]

[Footnote 1:  It becomes an interesting question whence the termites derive the large supplies of moisture with which they not only temper the clay for the construction of their long covered-ways above ground, but for keeping their passages uniformly damp and cool below the surface.  Yet their habits in this particular are unvarying, in the seasons of droughts as well as after rain; in the driest and least promising positions, in situations inaccessible to drainage from above, and cut off by rocks and impervious strata from springs from below.  Dr. Livingstone, struck with this phenomenon in Southern Africa, asks:  “Can the white ants possess the power of combining the oxygen and hydrogen of their vegetable food by vital force so as to form water?”—­Travels, p. 22.  And he describes at Angola an insect (A. goudotti?  Bennett.) resembling the Aphrophora