ORTHOPTERA. 131 



and the piercer, which is nearly three tenths of an inch long, is 

 brown and nearly straight. This little insect comes very near to 

 Locusta fasciata of De Geer, who, however, makes no mention 

 of the broad brown stripe on the head and thorax. I therefore 

 presume that our species is not the same, and propose to call it 

 Orchelimum gracile, the slender meadow-grasshopper. M. Ser- 

 ville, by whom this genus was instituted, has described three spe- 

 cies, two of which are stated to be North American, and the 

 remaining one is probably also from this country ; but his de- 

 scriptions do not answer for either of our species. Both of these 

 kinds of meadow-grasshoppers are eaten greedily by fowls of all 

 kinds. 



One more grasshopper remains to be described. It is distin- 

 guished from all the preceding species by having the head coni- 

 cal, and extending to a blunt point between the eyes. It belongs 

 to the genus Conoccphalus, a word expressive of the conical form 

 of the head, and, in my Catalogue of the Insects of Massachu- 

 setts, bears the specific name of ensiger, the sword-bearer, from 

 the long, straight, sword-shaped piercer of the female. It meas- 

 ures an inch or more from the point of the head to the end of the 

 body, and from one inch and three quarters to two inches, to the 

 end of the wing-covers. It is pale green, with the head whitish, or 

 only faintly tinted with green, and the legs and abdomen are pale 

 brownish green. A little tooth projects downwards from the un- 

 der side of the conical part of the head, which extends between 

 the antennae, and immediately before this little tooth is a black 

 line bent backwards on each side like the letter U. The hind- 

 most thighs have five or six exceedingly minute spines on the 

 inner ridge of the under-side. The shrilling organ of the male, on 

 the left wing-cover, is green and opake, but that on the right 

 has a space in the middle that is transparent like glass. The 

 piercer of the female is above an inch long, very slightly bent 

 near the body, and perfectly straight from thence to the tip, 

 which ends in a point. The color of this grasshopper is very apt 

 to change, after death, to a dirty brown. It comes very near to 

 the dissimilis described by M. Serville, but appears to be a dif- 

 ferent species.* 



* In the collection belonging to the Boston Society of Natural History, there is 



