Ant-hills, or rather the Termites which inhabit them, have also been used as an instrument of perhaps the most infernal torture the ingenuity of man has ever invented. For, in South Africa, at one time, the wretched victim, whether prisoner of war or offending subject, having been smeared with some oily substance, was partially interred in one of these heaps, and, if not first roasted to death by the burning sun, was literally devoured alive by the myriads of insects which have their habitation there. It has been asserted that even some Englishmen have met this dreadful fate.[458]
At Unyamwezi, in the lake regions of Central Africa, the natives chew the clay of Ant-hills as a substitute when their tobacco fails. They call this clay “sweet earth.” It is said the Arabs have also tried it without other effects than nausea.[459]
The goldsmiths of Ceylon employ the powdered clay of Ant-hills in preference to all other substances in the preparation of crucibles and moulds for their fine castings, for so delicate is the trituration to which the Termites subject this material;[460] and Knox says, “the people use this finer clay to make their earthen gods of, it is so pure and fine.”[461]
Termites, as an article of food, are eaten by the inhabitants of many countries. Mr. Kœnig, in his essay on the history of these insects, read before the Society of Naturalists
of Berlin, tells us, that to catch the Termites before their emigration, the natives of the East Indies make two holes in the nest, one to windward, and the other to leeward; at the latter aperture, they place a pot, rubbed with aromatic herbs. On the windward side they make a fire, the smoke of which drives these insects into the pots. By this method they take a great quantity, of which they make, with flour, a variety of pastry, which they sell to the poorer people. This author adds, that in the season in which this aliment is abundant, the abuse of it produces an epidemic colic and dysentery, which carries off the patient in two or three hours.[462]
The Africans, says Mr. Smeatham, are less ingenious in catching and preparing them. They content themselves in collecting those which fall into the water at the time of emigration. They skim them off the surface with calabashes, filling large caldrons with them, then grill them in iron pots, over a gentle fire, stirring them as coffee is stirred. They thus eat them by handfuls, without sauce, or any other preparation, and find them delicious. This gentleman has several times eaten them cooked in this manner, and thinks them delicate, nourishing, and wholesome, being sweeter than the grub of the palm-tree weevil (Calandra palmarum), and resembling in taste sugared cream or sweet almond paste.[463]
The Hottentots, Dr. Sparrman informs us, eat them greedily boiled and raw, and soon grow fat and plump upon this food.[464]
An idea may be formed of this dish by what once occurred to Dr. Livingstone on the banks of the Zouga, in South Africa. The Bayeiye chief Palani visiting this traveler while eating, he gave him a piece of bread and preserved apricots; and as the chief seemed to relish it much, he asked him if he had any food equal to that in his country. “Ah!” said the chief, “did you ever taste White-ants?” As the doctor never had, he replied, “Well, if you had, you never could have desired to eat anything better.”[465]
In the lake regions of Central Africa, says Burton, man
revenges himself upon the White-ant, and satisfies his craving for animal food, which in those regions oftentimes becomes a principle of action,—a passion,—by boiling the largest and fattest species, and eating them as a relish with his insipid porridge.[466]