to meet with
any of these fortresses, they were obliged to abandon the spot, unless
they could muster sufficient forces to lay regular siege to the enemy.
This they did by digging a circular trench all round the nest, and
filling it with a large quantity of dried wood, to the whole of which
they fire at the same time, by lighting it in different parts all round
the circumference. While the entrenchments are blazing, the edifice may
be destroyed by firing at it with cannon; and the ants being by this
means dispersed, have no avenue for escape except through the flames, in
which they perish." It might be worthy the attention of philosophers to
enquire, what general purposes in the economy of Nature these
wonder-working animals accomplish. The labours of certain other
creatures, there is every reason to believe, are destined to raise up
habitable islands in various parts of the ocean. May not these small
architects be employed in fitting certain soils for the growth of
vegetable substances? There seems, indeed, to exist in our world a
living spirit, or principle, continually operating in the production of
creatures, and places suitable for them, to compensate the loss of those
which an irrevocable law of the great Fabricator has doomed to
successive destruction, as if He chose to manifest the glory of His
wisdom and power, by creating new existences, rather than by preserving
the old ones.--E.]

The sea in this country is much more liberal of food to the inhabitants
than the land; and though fish is not quite so plenty here as they
generally are in higher latitudes, yet we seldom hauled the seine
without taking from fifty to two hundred weight. They are of various
sorts; but, except the mullet, and some of the shell-fish, none of them
are known in Europe: Most of them are palatable, and some are very
delicious. Upon the shoals and reef there are incredible numbers of the
finest green turtle in the world, and oysters of various kinds,
particularly the rock-oyster and the pearl-oyster. The gigantic cockles
have been mentioned already; besides which, there are sea-crayfish, or
lobsters, and crabs: Of these, however, we saw only the shells. In the
rivers and salt creeks there are aligators.

The only person who has hitherto given any account of this country or
its inhabitants is Dampier, and though he is, in general, a writer of
credit, yet in many particulars he is mistaken. The people whom he saw
were indeed inhabitants o