Series 03: Joseph Banks - Endeavour journal, 25 August 1768 - 12 July 1771 (vol. 2) - No. 0374
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[Page 374]
270
Some account of New Holland
from the infinite number myriads would come in an instant out of many holes & running over the hand tickle so as to be scarce endurable Rumphius has an account of this very bulb & its ants in the 6th Vol. p.120. where he describes also another sort the ants of which are black & larger the fourth sort were perfectly harmless at least they provd so to us tho they resembled almost minutely the white ants of the East Indies the most mischevous Insect I beleive known in the world their architecture was however far superior to that of any other species they had two kinds of Houses one suspended on the Branches of trees the other standing upright on the ground
the first sort were generaly 3 or 4 times as large as a mans head they were built of a brittle substance seemingly made of small parts of vegetables kneaded together with some glutinous matter probably afforded by themselves on breaking this outer crust innumerable cells appeard full of inhabitants in winding directions communicating