TENTH REPORT OF THE STATE ENTOMOLOGIST 423 



eggs enlarged are figured underneath the pupa^, but their peculiar 

 appearance, as made by repeated thrusts of the ovipositor, is more cor- 

 rectly given at e. A greatly magnified figure of the young cicada (the 

 larva) just as it hatches from the ^^^ and drops from the tree to enter 

 the ground and feed on the sap of the rootlets is given at /. Figure g 

 is another representation of the winged insect, in which one of the 

 wings has its natural position when at rest. 



The pupa comes from the ground through a smooth round hole 

 extending some distance downward, of the diameter of the tip of a 

 man's little finger. 



A remarkable departure from this usual habit has come to our notice 

 this year at a locality in New Baltimore, N. Y., sixteen miles south of 

 Albany, where, at least as early as the last week in April, the puj^ae 

 had brought up from apparently a considerable depth, masses of a soft 

 clay-like material and moulded it 

 above ground into rudely conical or 

 cylindric structure?, for their tem- 

 porary occupancy, it is supposed. 

 The ground was almost covered 

 with them. In places twenty-five 

 could be counted to the square foot. 

 They inclined at a considerable 

 angle from the perpendicular and 

 measured from two to three and a 

 half inches in height. The chamber]! 

 within was uniform in diameter 

 with the hole in the ground. Fig- 

 ures h and i, taken from photographs 



, T p 1 ^ Fig. 15— Clay buildingrs of th« seventeen-year 



on wood made tor the Country cicada. 



Gentleman, are of about two-thirds the natural size. The pupa, when 

 its full time has come, breaks a round opening through the upper part 

 of the chamber for its escape. 



It is not known when they were built or ht w they were made. Why 

 they were constructed by all of the insects in this locality and not 

 elsewhere is a mystery full of interest and for which no satisfactory 

 conjecture can be offered. Only two other instances of their occur- 

 rence in former years have been given by writers, and only one speci- 

 men up to the present is known in any collection — in that of the 

 National Museum at Washington, deposited there about twenty-five 

 years ago. 



The purpose of the present circular is to obtain all the information 

 of this interesting insect that can be secured during the remainder of 



