192 INSECTS INJURIOUS TO VEGETATION. 



towards the breast, the thorax is of moderate size, and does not 

 extend much, if at all, beyond the base of the wing-covers, and 

 does not conceal the head when viewed from above. Some of 

 the insects, with this small-sized thorax, are familiarly called, 

 in English works, cuckoo-spit and frog-hoppers, and to others 

 may be applied the name of leaf-hoppers, because they live 

 mostly on the leaves of plants. 



The thorax differs very much in shape in different kinds of 

 tree-hoppers (Membracidid^), and the variations of this part 

 are productive of many odd forms among these insects, and 

 particularly in foreign species. Among the species inhabiting 

 Massachusetts, there are some in which the thorax forms a 

 thin and high arched crest over the body, as in Memhracis 

 camelus of Fabricius, and the vau of my Catalogue. To these 

 the name of Membracis, which means sharp-edged, is most 

 applicable. In other species {31. emarffinata and sinuata of 

 Fabricius, and concava of Say) the crest of the thorax is deeply 

 notched on the top. In others the whole of the thorax is not 

 elevated longitudinally in the middle, but only in some part; 

 thus M. Ampelopsidis has an oblong square crest on the middle 

 of the thorax; M. bimaculata of Fabricius and univittata of my 

 Catalogue have a thin horn-like projection, blunt, however, at 

 the end, extending obliquely forwards and upwards from the 

 fore part of the thorax ; and M. binotata and latipes of Say 

 have a similarly situated horn, narrower however, and curved, 

 so as to give to the insects, when viewed sidewise, the shape 

 of a bird; and, lastly, in M. bubalus of Fabricius, diceros of 

 Say, and taurina of my Catalogue, the ridge of the thorax, 

 viewed from above, has somewhat the shape of the letter T, 

 becoming broad at the fore part, and extending outwards on 

 each side like a pair of short thick horns, which gave rise to 

 the foregoing specific names, meaning buffalo, two-horned, and 

 kine-like. 



The habits of some of the tree-hoppers are presumed to be 

 much the same as those of the musical harvest-flies, for they 

 are found on the limbs of trees, where they deposit their eggs, 

 only during the adult state, and probably pass the early period 

 of their existence in the ground. Others, however, are known 



