POPULAR MISCELLANY. 



765 



Distribntion of the Seventeca-Tear Lo- 

 enst. Mr. L. G. Olmstead, of Fort Edward, 

 sends us an account of a recent interview 

 with Dr. Asa Fitch, the distinguished ento- 

 mologist of Salem, New York, from which we 

 exti'act the following particulars concerning 

 the habits and geographical distribution of 

 the seventeen-year locust, which has but 

 lately planted the seeds for the crop of 1894 : 



"The seveiiteen-year locust, the Cicada 

 septeitdecim thus named by Linnaeus, the 

 prince of natural historians has just made 

 its regular visit to the woods north of 

 Clark's mills, below Fort Miller Bridge, on 

 the Hudson River. Fort Miller Bridge is 

 their extreme northern limit. From time 

 immemorial they have appeared on the same 

 spots. If the woods are cleared up, they 

 resort to the nearest orchards. They are 

 found from this locality south along the 

 Hudson, on through New Jersey, Delaware, 

 Pennsylvania, Maryland, Virginia, the Caro- 

 linas, and Georgia. They come out in im- 

 mense numbers, the woods resounding with 

 the din of their notes. 



" There is an annual Cicada which ap- 

 pears in dog-days, whose shrill note is quite 

 dirt'erent from the seventeen-year locust. 

 The notes of this last arc not unlike those 

 of the tree-toad, and they were heard at 

 Clark's mills above the noise of the ma- 

 chinery. 



" They sing when the sun shines. When 

 growing old their note is much more feeble. 

 The males alone sing; the females are si- 

 lent, and this has given rise to the distich : 



' Happy are the Cicadas' lives, 

 Because they all have voiceless wives.' 



" This is their fourth visit that the doc- 

 tor has observed. He has gathered and con- 

 fined scores of them, under netting on an 

 apple-bush to keep them from being de- 

 voured by birds, which collect to feed on 

 them in immense numbers, as do the swine, 

 and such wild animals as skunks, weasels, 

 etc. 



" The locusts puncture the bark of trees 

 and live on the juice. They do not disturb 

 herbaceous plants. They pierce the twigs 

 and deposit two eggs in each puncture, 

 which are probably male and female. The 

 grub hatches and drops to the ground, into 

 which it is said to go to great depths, and is 

 seventeen years in getting its growth. They 



sometimes come up in the bottom of newly- 

 dug cellars, and where roads are made across 

 districts they have occupied, and they work 

 themselves up through the hardest beaten 

 highway. On coming out of the ground 

 they immediately pair, and the female com- 

 mences boring the twigs and depositing her 

 eggs, which occupies her about three weeks, 

 when they die and disappear. They never 

 do any appreciable injury to the trees. This 

 seventeen-year locust is not found in any 

 other part of the world. 



" They left Fort Miller about the 25th of 

 June, leaving an appointment to hold an- 

 other great concert on the same ground in 

 1894. The twigs of witch-hazel, poplar, 

 maple, hickory, oak, etc., are beautifully 

 punctured and as regularly as the stitches 

 on a horse's harness, thus 



Sometimes there will be two rows on the 

 under side of the same twig, thus 



Many twigs of the oak have died from the 

 puncturings. 



" There is also a third species of locust in 

 this county, of which only a very few appear. 

 The species of Cicada are numerous in warm 

 climates. The doctor has in his collection 

 ninety-two species. He has the three found 

 in tl)is county ; others from Pennsylvania, 

 Illinois, Arkansas, Mississippi, Alabama ; 

 the Bahama Islands, Jamaica, Venezuela, 

 Brazil; Colombia, Chili ; a number from 

 France, Spain, Italy, Egypt, Algiers, Cape 

 of Good Hope, Senegal, Madagascar; the 

 Crimea, Sylhet (a part of British India), 

 Borneo, Java, Ceylon, Assam, Malacca, and 

 New Holland." 



Cremation of Dr. Cliarles F. Winslow. 



The following, from a gentleman who took 

 an active part in the cremation of the body 

 of the late Dr. Winslow, at Salt Lake City, 

 on July 31st, contains many interesting de- 

 tails concerning this event not before pub- 

 lished : 



"Dr. Winslow always had a dread of 

 being buried in the ground ; perhaps not 

 a dread, but he had seen many bodies that 

 had suffered the slow decomposition and 

 ravages of the worms, and the thought 

 was disgusting to him. His heart was 

 taken out and embalmed, placed in a jar, 



