Page:Insects - Their Ways and Means of Living.djvu/167

 the tip of the abdomen comes against the wing bases, the encumbering organs are broken off. It may be observed that there is a suture across the base of each wing just to make the breaking easy.

The now wingless termites, being young males and females just come to maturity, naturally pair off; but



not for a companionate marriage, which, it must be confessed, is the popular form of matrimony with most insects. The termites take the vows of lifetime fidelity, or "till death do us part," for with the female termite intensive domesticity and maternity are the ruling passions. To find a home site and there found a colony is her consuming ambition, and, whether the male likes it or not, he must accept her conditions. The female, therefore, searches out a hole or a crevice in a dead tree or a decayed stump, or crawls under a piece of wood lying on the ground, and the male follows. If the site