ORDER III.—STRAIGHT-WINGED INSECTS. 115 
The House or Domestic Cricker (Acheta domestica) is 
smaller than the Field-cricket, being about one inch long, 
and of a yellowish color. It dwells in the cracks of walls 
and floors, particularly in bake-houses and breweries, and 
wherever else they can find bread, and meal, and moistened 
grain, for they are always thirsty; and in houses, if they 
can not get a sufficiency of water elsewhere, they attack 
wet shoes and clothes. They are provided with wings, 
with which they fly from place to place, and from house to 
house; and there have been people superstitious enough to 
believe that if a Cricket flies from another house into theirs 
and commences its melancholy song, it is a signal of the 
death of some member of the family. But such supersti- 
tions are not common nowadays; on the contrary, their 
presence is very generally considered an omen of good, and 
among country people every where the song of the Cricket 
is agreeable and highly prized. 
It is a true remark that the deepest emotions are those 
most noiseless. When the patriot Lafayette visited this 
country many years ago, he was received with distinguished 
applause and parade wherever he went; the citizens of 
every city and village through which he passed exerted 
themselves to the utmost to do him honor, and the country 
resounded with the merry ringing of bells, with the trum- 
pet of jubilee, and with the booming cannonade. But the 
greatest compliment paid him, and that which affected his 
noble heart most deeply, was in a little country village, in 
which there was no band of music, no firing of guns, no 
soldiery, no parade, but at the entrance of which the in- 
habitants met him with uncovered heads and waving hand- 
kerchiefs as he passed under the arch they had erected over 
the road, and which bore this inscription: 
‘‘Come then, Expressive Silence, muse his praise !” 
And so it is with the mind of man, generally ; any thing 
