114 NORTH AMERICAN INSECTS. 
before the entrance to their abodes, ready to retreat in case 
of necessity. 
They eat grass, seeds, and fruit, and with great industry 
carry their provisions into their holes, that they may con- 
sume them at their leisure. They are very fond of drink- 
ing, but are extremely delicate about it, and will only 
touch the water that adheres to leaves, literally as well as 
poetically slaking their thirst with only the dew of leaves 
and flowers. In their journeys they are very careful to 
avoid water, and if a small stream or puddle happens to be 
in their way they carry pebbles into it, or grass or small 
pieces of wood, until they fill it up so that they can pass 
over it without getting wet; and this instinct teaches them 
to do, because if they should wet their antennz they would 
trouble them by sticking together. 
Crickets, when young and before they are provided with 
wings, live peacefully together under stones, but as they 
get their growth and wings they become great enemies to 
each other. The females bite off the legs of the males, 
and the males themselves are continually fighting with each 
other. If they meet face to face, they butt one another like 
rams; and if they meet back to back, they kick like horses. 
This quarrelsome disposition of Field-crickets may be 
made serviceable in getting rid of the House-crickets, for it 
is only necessary to bring a few of the former into the 
house, or rooms, which is infested with the latter, and war 
will take place in the camp immediately. 
The youth of Germany, however, are extremely fond of 
them, and there is scarcely a boy who has not several small 
boxes made expressly for keeping his Crickets in. ‘They 
catch them by thrusting a long flexible stem of grass into 
their holes and forcing them out, and so much delighted 
are they with their music that they carry their boxes of 
Crickets into their bedrooms at night, and are soothed to 
sleep with their chirping lullaby. 
