The Cicada: his Music 



amply makes up for its absence by the 

 enormous resonator of his belly. 



I have never seen the third Cicada, 

 sketched by Reaumur and described by 

 Olivier ^ under the name of C. tomentosa. 

 The species is known in Provence, so this and 

 that one tells me, by the name of the Cigalon, 

 or rather Cigaloun, the Little Cigale or 

 Cicada. This designation is unknown in my 

 neighbourhood. 



I possess two other specimens which Re- 

 aumur probably confused with the one of 

 which he gives us a drawing. One is the 

 Black Cicada (C. atra, Oliv.), whom I came 

 across only once; the other is the Pigmy Ci- 

 cada (C pygmaa, Oliv.), vv^hom I have 

 picked up pretty often. I will say a few 

 words about this last one. 



He is the smallest member of the genus 

 in my district, the size of an average Gad-fly, 

 and measures about three-quarters of an inch 

 in length. His cymbals are transparent, with 

 three opaque veins, are scarcely sheltered by 



' Guillaume Antoine Olivier (1756-1814), a distin- 

 guished French entomologist, author of an Histoire na- 

 turelle des coleopteres, in six volumes (1789-1808), and 

 part author of the nine volumes devoted to a Diction- 

 naire de I'histoire naturelle des insectes in the Ency- 

 clopedie methodique (1789-1819). — Translator's Note. 



73 



