158 Zoological Collections. 



of apple-trees ; they appear to be very fond of young trees of this kind 

 and of the forest-trees they seem to have a decided preference for the beech, 

 on which they collect in vast multitudes; and when any one passes near, 

 they make a great noise, and screaming, with their air-bladders, or bag' 

 pipes. These bags are placed under, and rather behind the wings, in the 

 axilla, something in the manner of using the bagpipes, with the bags under 

 the arms— I coidd compare them to nothing else ; and indeed I suspect the 

 first inventor of the instrument borrowed his ideas from some insect of this 

 kind. They play a variety of notes and sounds, one of which nearly imitates 

 the scream of the tree-toad. 



June 12. — The cicadae still very busy depositing their eggs in the tender 

 branches — which branches die and fall off. The male only makes the 

 singing noise from the bladder under his wings. The female has no wind 

 instrument, but an instrument like a drill or punch, in the centre of her 

 abdomen, with which she forms the holes to deposit her eggs — the same 

 instrument also deposits an egg at the instant the hole is made. The 

 punctures, or holes, are about an eighth of an inch apart, and in the heart 

 or pith of the branch on its under side. One cicada will lay an immense 

 number ; by the appearance of one I opened to day each fly is furnished 

 with at least one thousand eggs. 



May 27. I find the following record.—" This day, and for two or three 

 days past, the locust, or cicada is beginning to appear in vast quantities 

 on the trees and bushes in the woods ; they seem yet not to be fully grown, 

 nor very active, but are easily caught. The hogs are very fond of them 

 and devour all they can find, and indeed they seem to have commenced 

 their attack on them, by rooting, before they left the ground. It is thir- 

 teen days since they first began to break from the earth, but did not leave 

 their holes, in any great numbers, on account of the cold, till lately." The 

 last of June, the cicadae gradually disappeared. At this time the females 

 were very weak and exhausted ; and some which I examined appeared to 

 have wasted away to mere skeletons, nothing remaining but their wings 

 and an empty shell of a body. Since that time few or none have appeared 

 in this county; but I have heard of their being seen in some of the neigh- 

 bouring states, I believe east of the mountains. 



While the cicadae remained with us, I could not discover that they made 

 use of any kind of food, although I examined them repeatedly and par- 

 ticularly for this purpose. All the injury they did to vegetation was in 

 depositing their eggs ; by this process they materially injured, and, in some 

 instances nearly destroyed, young orchards of apple-trees. Many of them 

 to this day will bear ample testimony to the truth of this remark, in their 

 mutilated limbs and knotted branches. 



In addition to the foregoing observations, I have learnt to a certainty, 

 that it is seventeen years since the cicadae were here before. Early in the 

 spring of 1795, a clearing was commenced eight miles above this place, 

 on the Muskingum, and an orchard put out on the piece, perhaps half an 

 acre, that was cut over before the cicadae appeared ; the rest of the clear- 

 ing was made the same season, after they had disappeared. When they 



