442- Voyage of the Novara. 



countered at every corner — it was taken out whenever a call 

 was paid — the whole city resounded with its shrill cry. The 

 fine arts, and every branch of industry, felt its impulsCo There 

 was no textile fabric, no embroidery, no design, no vessel, on 

 which it did not conspicuously figure. It was represented in 

 metal and in jewellery, and no handsome lady thought her 

 toilette complete, unless she sported a grasshopper among her 

 hair. This mania has died out in China, but the buzz of the 

 insect still continues to furnish matter of amusement for the 

 populace and children of all classes, and they are still caught 

 in large quantities, and exposed for sale in the streets. Sin- 

 gular to say, all ancient and modern writers, if we are to 

 judge by their delineations, describe these insects as cicad(E^ 

 whereas it was shown and proved by the researches of one of 

 the zoologists of the Expedition, that the insect is no cicada^ 

 but a species of grasshopper [Decticus), which, so far as ap- 

 pears, has never hitherto been described. Very probably the 

 circumstance that the noise made by each of these insects is 

 very similar, gave circulation to this error of upwards of 

 a thousand years' standing, whence people would without fur- 

 ther examination take it for Ranted that the insect confined 

 in the cage belonged to that species whose place in natural 

 history, and whose special musical qualifications, mankind had 

 so long been familiar with. One of these grasshoppers was 

 kept for months in such a cage on board our ship, and chirped 

 away lustily, fair weather or foul, even when confined in a 



