98 NORTH AMERICAN INSECTS. 
out being annoyed with them, as they unceremoniously fly 
in your face, or alight on your arms, shoulders, and head. 
This Grasshopper is about one and a half inches long, and 
with expanded wings about three inches broad. Its wing- 
covers are of a dusky brown color, and its wings black, 
with a yellow band on the margin. 
But there are also found in the United States a great 
number of many other species, which are generally distin- 
euished from each other by the color of their wings. 
The largest and handsomest species of Grasshoppers are 
found in South America, one of which I will incidentally 
mention, as it is commonly found in private entomological 
collections. This is the Grillus dux, an enormons insect, 
its wings, when expanded, measuring a foot, and its wing- 
covers beautifully colored red and blue, with black spots. 
The wings themselves, when not expanded, are folded to- 
gether like a fan, as is the case with all other species. 
But all Grasshoppers, whether handsome or not, are to 
be considered and classed as noxious insects. They de- 
vour every kind of vegetation, and were it not for Nature’s 
great law of compensation, so admirably carried out in our 
own highly-favored country, this land would long since 
have been laid waste by the ravages of these rapacious in- 
sects. As it is, an abundance of majestic streams, lakes, 
and ponds water our country from all sides, and by their 
evaporation afford sufficient rain for moistening the ground 
and making it fruitful in the production of vegetables for 
the support of man, as well as rendering it a fit abode for 
numerous reptiles, such as snakes, turtles, lizards, salaman- 
ders, frogs, and toads. Now these reptiles all feed more or 
less on insects, and in preference on Grasshoppers, of which 
they annually destroy an innumerable quantity. Hence 
these hideous reptiles are the instruments made use of by a 
kind Providence to rid us of a greater evil. We can only 
form an estimate of the damage that would be done to 
