\62 



Marvels of Insect Life. 



trills per second, all alike, and with equal intervals, except the last two or three, which 

 with the closing of the wing-covers run into each other. The whole strongly recalls 

 the slow turning of a child's wooden rattle, ending by a sudden jerk of the same ; 

 and this prolonged rattling, which is peculiar to the male, is invariably and instantly 

 answered by a single sharp ' chirp ' or ' tschick ' from one or more females, who 

 produce the sound by a sudden upward jerk of the wings." The kat3-did properlv 

 so-called^ is a native of the vSouthern and Eastern States. The bright-green wing- 

 covers are very leaf-like, and so long that the wings are entirely hidden. The antennae 

 are considerably longer than the entire length of the body. The female has a long, 

 curved, sword-shaped egg-placer that is almost as long as her hind-body. The 

 end of it is sharp pointed, and the lower edge is slightly toothed at this part. By 



means of this organ the 

 slate-coloured eggs are 

 placed in crevices of bark 

 and the soft shoots of 

 woody plants. 



But the commonest 

 of the North American 

 species is the angular- 

 winged katydid,"^ and this 

 is the species whose life- 

 history has been closely 

 studied and worked out 

 by Mr. C. V. Riley, fi'om 

 whose account we have 

 already quoted his refer- 

 ence to its notes. Its 

 green, net-veined wings 

 are long, and the shorter 

 wing-covers are broad and 

 of the same colour. The 

 egg-placer of the female is 

 very .short and strongly 

 curved in accordance with 

 her habit of gluing her eggs 

 to shoots instead of burying them iii the ground or hiding them in crevices. This 

 operation is performed mostly at night, and she begins by bitin? the bark of the 

 selected shoot to make it rough and so afford a better hold for the eggs. There are 

 many batches laid, from the beginning of September onwards, and altogether one 

 female will lay from a hundred and fifty to two hundred ei.'L'^s 



Towards spring the eggs swell up somewhat and lose their flat appearance. 

 Early in May these hatch, and the yoimg katydids emerge from the free end of the 

 egg. In the act of hatching they cast their first skin, and leave it, a white, crumpled 

 film, attached to the split egg-shell. Its body is now an eighth of an inch long, 

 but with its hind-legs and its antennae extended fore and aft, it measures half an inch 



1 Pterophylla concavus. - Orophus retinervis. 



Phgto by] 



Nest of AIarabunter Wasp. 



[H. Baili 



The nest of a Brazilian species which is attached to a bough so that the single entrance 

 is beneath. The cardboard-hke material of the case is so solid that it is said the surface 

 may be written upon with a fine pen. 



