i28o Rural School Leaflet 



abdomen, and beneath them are vestiges of wings, which are never used. 

 The male has larger wing covers than the female, and they are veined in 

 a peculiar scroll pattern. This veining seems to be a framework for 

 the purpose of making a sounding board of the wing membrane, by stretch- 

 ing it out as a diiimhcad is stretched. Near the base of the wing cover 

 there is a heavy cross vein covered with transverse ridges, which is called 

 the file; on the inner edge of the same wing, near the base, is a hardened 

 part called the scraper. When he makes his cr>', the cricket lifts his 

 wing centers at an angle of forty-five degrees and draws the scraper of 

 the under wing against the file of the overlapping one; lest his musical 

 apparatus become worn out, he can change by putting the other wing 

 cover above. The wing covers are excellent sounding boards, and they 

 quiver as the note is made, setting the air in vibration and sending the 

 sound a long distance. The wing covers of the female cricket are more 

 nonnal in venation. The female may always be distinguished from her 

 spouse by the long, swordlike ovipositor at the end of her body; this 

 she thrusts into the ground when she lays her eggs, thus placing them 

 where they will remain safely protected during the winter. Both sexes 

 have a pair of " tail feathers," as the children call them, which are known 

 as the cerei (singular, cercus) and are fleshy prongs at the end of the 

 abdomen. 



There would be no use of the cricket's playing his mandolin if there 

 were not an appreciative ear to listen to his music. This ear is placed 

 most conveniently in the tibia of the front leg, so that the crickets literally 

 hear with their elbows, as do the katydids and the meadow grasshoppers. 

 The ear is easily seen with the naked eye as a little, white, disklike spot. 



The chirp of the cricket is, in literature, usually associated with the 

 coming of autumn; but the careful listener may hear it in early summer, 

 although the song is not then so insistent as later in the season. The 

 cricket usually commences singing in the afternoon and keeps it up period- 

 ically all night. The writer has always been an admirer of the manly, 

 dignified methods of this little " minnesinger," who does not wander 

 abroad to seek his lady love but stands sturdily at his own gate, playing 

 his mandolin the best he is able; he has faith that his sable sweetheart is 

 not far away, and that if she likes his song she will come to him of her 

 own free will. The cricket is ever a lover of warmth, and his mandolin 

 gets out of tune soon after the evenings become frosty. He is a jealous 

 musician. When he hears the note of a rival, he at once bristles up, 

 lifting his wings at a higher angle and giving off a sharp mlHtant note. 

 If the two rivals come in sight of each other, there is a fierce duel. They 

 rush at each other with wide open jaws, and fight until one is conquered 

 and retreats, often minus an antenna, a cercus, or even a leg. 



