STRIDULATION OF INSECTS. d\) 



dull and harsh ones : this may be caused by some injury which 

 the membrane of the drum (tambour) has received, or from 

 some defect in the bow, the teeth of which would be worn by 

 long and frequent use. 



If we detach the elytra of a long-winged grasshopper, we 

 shall find the musical instrument placed upon the back-cover, 

 very near the origin, where the elytra are dilated at the inner 

 border. In looking at the right elytron from above, we see 

 an oblong transparent hyaline space, which is of a hard con- 

 sistence, and sonorous, to which the name of drum (tambour) 

 may be given. It is surrounded by a border, which is thickest 

 at the interior margin, to which I have given the name of 

 treble-string. The drum is surrounded by a band of a nearly 

 similar consistence, but hardly so transparent, and slightly 

 convex at the lower part, on which two nervures are per- 

 ceptible. On the top of the left elytron viewed from below, 

 a dilatation is seen analogous to that of the right, but not so 

 transparent. Its consistence appears to resemble that of the 

 other portion of the elytron. What is most remarkable about 

 it is a thick nervure, striated like a file, which crosses it in 

 a nearly parallel direction to its upper border, which I have 

 named the bow. Underneath the right elytron, along the 

 upper border of the drum, we may distinguish, with the assist- 

 ance of a glass, another little bow, which appeared to me little 

 calculated to produce sounds, and which we will designate the 

 false-bow (faux-arcliet). I was not able to excite a sound by 

 rubbing it on the elytra. It may be, however, that during the 

 movements which the grasshopper makes when singing, this 

 bow is rubbed on the dorsal part of the metathorax, or on the 

 border of the wing, and that it contributes in this way to 

 stridulation ; but I have not observed any thing confirmatory 

 of such a conjecture. 



The musical instruments of the long-winged grasshoppers, 

 such as L. xerrucitora^ viridissima^ Ulifolia, grisea, &c., nearly 

 resemble those that have just been described ; and, as we have 

 already observed, the males alone are provided with them ; the 

 females being without, are mute. 



The saddled grasshopper (EpMppiger) possesses a remark- 

 able property, which is not observable in any of the stridulant 

 insects hereinbefore mentioned, nor in those which I shall 

 have occasion hereafter to examine : it is, that the females have 



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