INSECT VAEIETY. 



61 



sorts of notes are often the call for the males to assemble, and 

 thus originate fierce conflicts. The music of Insecta will, I hope 

 to show, admit of parallel treatment ; the buzz of the bee and 

 drumming- of the cicadae, alike traceable to the agency of the 

 tracheae, representing the vocal kind, and the song of the cricket, 

 produced by mechanical means, the instrumental, the latter music 

 here taking precedence; and, assuming the power of modulation, 

 we witness the former kind susceptible of in Aves, agreeably with 

 the low bronchial stage of the trachea, which as other animal organs, 

 has its origin in a multiple or complex form. This instrumental 

 language has been termed Stridulation by Colonel Goureau. 



We shall find, by careful consideration of these societies that 

 gather at the accents of the emotions, that with some certainty 

 it may be postulated that either, A, the males at a certain 

 season form a more or less pronounced choral dance in air, and 

 are then joined by, or seek, the females-; or, B, the males 

 become musical, generally in company, and attract the females ; 

 or male and female each sing, and own a mutual attraction. 

 The first of these societies appears generally due to light or 

 colour display, and in some measure may often be the result 

 of vocal music ; the latter may be due to the workings of instru- 

 mental or vocal music. The orders of insects in which these 

 two laws find expression may thus be tabulated : — 



Here the rank in which the Order stands is an attempt to express 

 the ascertained tendency of the insects composing it to form 

 dances in air, or an indication of the prevalauce of the organs for 

 music. The Homoptera, B {a), although the males of the 

 Cicadidae congregate by a music of the vocal kind, have as yet 

 afforded no dancers, and the Diptera no instrumental musicians. 

 A third and singular instance, probably a modification of Rule A, 

 is seen in the swarming or migration of the Hive Bee, where the 



