160 THE CAUSES WHICH PROPAGATE 



perceptibly decrease after dusk, and increase towards morning-. 

 In solitary captivity in a box a male will respond throughout the 

 hours of shadow to the chipping of freestone, strokes from a 

 village clock, champing bit, or twitter of a startled finch ; but 

 if two be enclosed, they will be found to sustain a running 

 cymbal-clash day and night, accelerated to as many as twelve 

 chirps a minute — '^ Kre ! kre ! kre ! " Often, too, we may thus 

 hear them, angrily responding head to head, alcoved beneath 

 a weedy bush or ivied hedge-bank, demonstrating a most mar- 

 vellous temper and elasticity, in the one hundred and twenty 

 incessantly-scraping indentations on the circular lima of their 

 squamose and cup-shaped wing-cymbals. The female squats 

 among them as they chirp, and is herself virtually with- 

 out wings or elytra. This species is one of the best of the 

 indigenous leaf-crickets to keep in a box, from the low tone and 

 pleasing nature of its note ; and it will thrive well and sing on till 

 the first frosts, if only supplied with a few blades of grass. The 

 similar music of the Apterous Thamnotrizon of Fabricius is per- 

 ceptible from a considerable distance, and consists of from six 

 to nine quickly-consecutive strokes broken by short pau.ses. 



The diurnal species of the genus Becticiis (Ser.) frequent the 

 high graminese of all temperate regions, and crepitate in sun- 

 shine. Who has not heard of the Pah-pulc-keena, the patrony- 

 mic of the storm-fool, " shrill and ceaseless,^'' during the 

 summer heatj in the corn-fields of Gitche Gumee? The lima 

 of the Wart-biter {Becticus verrucivorus) , the European corn- 

 frequenter, has from seventy-one to ninety dentations, and 

 its music, a harsh knife-whetting, possesses a soft hazy resonance 

 like murmuring steam, predisposing to summer slumber and 

 reverie. These dreamy snatches continue from four to five 

 m.inutes, with intervals broken by "Screet! screet!''' a sound like 

 a stray sheep bell, or one canary-like and low. And then 

 a fitful part-playing from two of the males in a barley- 

 field has quite the zest of a band of Christy Minstrels ; 

 or should a male bestow an antennal caress on a female 

 among the cockles and poppies, his rivals immediately 

 wander about crepitating with a sweeter plaint, for their 

 jealousy is excessive. As regards pairing, Roesel informs us 

 that when a female is attracted by a male, previous to coupling, 



