TWO STRANGE GRASSHOPPERS 



exposed, without any protection, to snow and rain. 

 Those in my jar had spent two-thirds of the year in a 

 state of comparative dryness. Since they were sown 

 like seeds, perhaps they needed, to make them hatch, 

 the moisture that seeds require to make them sprout. 

 I resolved to try. 



I placed at the bottom of some glass tubes a pinch 

 of backward eggs taken from my collection, and on the 

 top I heaped lightly a layer of fine, damp sand. I closed 

 the tubes with plugs of wet cotton, to keep the air in them 

 constantly moist. Any one seeing my preparations 

 would have supposed me to be a botanist experimenting 

 with seeds. 



My hopes were fulfilled. In the warmth and mois- 

 ture the eggs soon showed signs of hatching. They 

 began to swell, and the bursting of the shell was evi- 

 dently close at hand. I spent a fortnight in keeping 

 a tedious watch at every hour of the day, for I had to 

 surprise the young Decticus actually leaving the egg, 

 in order to solve a question that had long been in my 

 mind. 



The question was this. The Grasshopper is buried, 

 as a rule, about an inch below the surface of the soil. 

 Now the new-born Decticus, hopping awkwardly in the 

 grass at the approach of summer, has, like the full-grown 

 insect, a pair of very long tentacles, as slender as hairs; 



[133] 



