82 THE PERIODICAL CICADA. 
tral or supporting piece, have serrated cutting edges, and are the chief 
agents in piercing twigs preparatory to the deposition of eggs (fig. 36). 
The relative position of the three parts of the ovipositor and the 
nature of the locking tongues, grooves, and clasps, which make one 
tube of the whole, are illustrated in the accompanying cross sections 
(e237): 
The different pieces of the ovipositor attach to flat plates partly 
concealed within and attaching to the wall of the abdomen, and are 
operated by powerful muscles both in making incisions in the twigs 
and in passing the eggs from the oviduct (which opens at the base. 
of the ovipositor) through the tube formed by the three parts of the 
instrument, unti! they reach their final 
lodgment in the twig. The act of oviposi- 
tion will be described in another place. 
THE MUSICAL APPARATUS. 
Perhaps the most interesting feature of 
the anatomy of the Cicada to the popular 
mind is the musical apparatus, by means 
of which it makes its peculiar note, or song. 
This apparatus and the sounds produced by 
its possessor have been studied and de- 
scribed by many naturalists, beginning with 
the very earliest, and, in fact, the fullest and 
most aceurate description of the method of 
of producing sounds and the anatomical 
structure of the vocal organ in these insects 
F1G.37.—Cross section of ovipositor is the one given, early in the last century, 
Byes, Yee cok by that famous French pioneer in the study 
to showinterlocking tonguesand of the biology and anatomy of insects, 
grooves. (Author’s illustration.) Réaumur.4 
The work of Réaumur was confirmed and added to a hundred years 
later by a most painstaking study of living specimens by another 
French student, Solier,’ and for a minute technical description of the 
anatomy and workings of the sound apparatus the reader is referred 
to these authors. 
The special modification and structure of these parts in our periodi- 
cal species have been studied by the more important older writers, 
as Potter and Smith, and more recently by W. J. Burnett¢ and E. G. 
Love.4 
aHistoire des Insects, Vol. V (1740), pp. 158-170, pl. 17. 
bAnn. Soc. Ent. France, 1837, Vol. VI, pp. 199-217. 
cProc. Bost. Soc. Nat. Hist., 1851, Vol. IV, p. 72. 
dJourn. N. Y. Micros. Soc., 1895, XI, pp. 39-42. 
