STRAKlin WIXdED INSECTS 



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When cliililreii play with |icl)l)lcs on the licach. tlifv often put the red ones 

 in one group, the white i>ues in another. It is niueh the same with men, tliey 

 try to put the things that are alike together, and in the bewildering multitude 

 of shajies and forms and lialiits with which the inseet specialists have had 

 to deal, they catch at any siniilaritx'. and i)nt together in one grou|) a lot of 

 creatures which are only alike in a few i)articnlars. 



In the straight-winged order of ort]io|)tera they ha\e i)ut the creatures 

 which ha\'e four wings, the front i>air licing leather-like and smaller than the 

 other pair, which latter fold up like a fan. They are also all e(|ui])])ed with 

 strong hiting jaws. Bugs often look like them, imt liug> ha\'c licaks and 

 never jaws. 



It is in this order that are found nearly all of the true song-insects, at least 

 so far as luunan ears can tell. The grassho])])ers, the katydids and crickets 

 are the great nnisic makers of the insect world, although it is true that there 

 is one, perhaps the loudest, shrillest singer of them all which is classifietl 

 among the hugs, the lyreman, or cicada, one of the .species of which is known 

 as the seventeen-year locust. 



AVlien we talk of the hum of insects we do not often sto]) to think that it is 

 (juite a ditlerent thing in general from their song. Most insects in their Hight, 

 providing that their wings mo\e fast enough, make some kind of a noise. 

 The humming of the l)ee, the Inizzingof the house fly antl mos(puto and the 

 whirring of the clumsy beetle's wings are finite a different thing from the con- 

 scious song of the katydid to its mate, or the singing of the cricket on the 

 hearth. 



Of course it i-. iin|io-,sil)le for u^ to be quite sure that there is not a host of 

 insects who have means of making >omc kind of a noise wliich is so high u|) 

 in the scale of noises as to be too faint for us to licar. 



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