28 THE AMERICAN MUSEUM JOURNAL 
to run to the end of a broom straw. These 
precautions were necessary in preserving the 
absolute cleanliness of her tiny yard, which 
on the projecting screen would be magnified 
thousands of areas. The spinning of her egg 
cocoon was successfully accomplished and we 
awaited with much anxiety the time when the 
young spiders would emerge and crawl upon 
the parent’s back — hundreds of them, pre- 
senting an indescribable spectacle. At last 
this chapter of the family history was recorded 
and there was a wait of eight days for the 
infants to swarm from the mother’s back and 
shift for themselves. This process may be 
spectacularly inaugurated by a sudden vibra- 
tion of the ground, causing the parent to 
jump — then a riot of the spiderlings swarms 
over the ground. 
An additional camera was trained into the 
field, for once the dispersal takes place all is 
over and the little spiders are gone. The 
critical time, when the youngsters appeared 
uneasy, arrived on a humid evening, when a 
heavy electrical storm was brewing. The 
rectifiers for the mercury vapor lamps were 
already giving some trouble as the cameras 
were adjusted. With the cameras running, 
we dropped a steel ball upon the metal stand 
containing the spider arena to cause it to 
vibrate, and the spider family departed to all 
points of the compass. This was an event we 
had anxiously awaited and luck appeared to 
be with the photographer. As the electrician 
prepared to throw out the main switch and 
extinguish the illuminating batteries, lght- 
ning followed the feed wires into the studio 
and gave us a week’s work repairing burned- 
out parts. But the history of the spider 
family was completed minus a few feet of 
film showing the exit of the more laggard 
members. 
So many insects are tiny, almost micro- 
scopic creatures and such a large propor- 
tion of them perform their characteristic 
capers in inaccessible places that the value 
of greatly enlarged motion picture portrayals 
opens previously impossible opportunities 
for study and observation in the schoolroom. 
By these methods students are enabled to see 
habits that the greater number of them would 
never in any other way observe. Not one 
child in a million has seen the katydid 
sing, the praying mantis rear in frightful 
pose, grasp and devour a fly, a gaudy grass- 
hopper carefully brush pollen dust from its 
face. 
It is not so difficult to obtain motion pic- 
tures of insects eating because these creatures 
are always hungry and persist in satisfying 
their appetites even under greatly disturbed 
conditions, but to obtain scenes of nervous 
spiders caring for their young and to show 
insects singing — that is a different matter. 
To photograph the katydid smging was 
a difficult task. This insect smgs by scrap- 
ing the wings together and only at might. A 
light of any kind will stop it. Yet to photo- 
eraph a singing specimen at night meant that 
a stream of powerful electric hght must be 
turned upon the songster. The deed was done 
in a grove of young oaks close to the studio. 
Several dozen katydids were placed in the 
trees and the camera — on a high tripod — 
focused on the vegetation of a tree in the 
center of the grove. The instrument, with 
special long focus lens was to record the 
movement of a single insect that watched all 
proceedings, but remained silent owing to our 
close arrangements with the machines. The 
camera was then belted to a small motor so 
that no operator would stand by the instru- 
ment to disturb the insect. A searchlight, 
such as is used in the navy was then trained on 
the single tree in which reposed the actor, its 
powerful rays making photography possible. 
With the remainder of the grove in darkness 
the decoy katydids sang vigorously. In 
the intense beam of violet light the principal 
in this educational drama was seen turning 
slowly. Was it irritated by the light, and 
would it crawl from the lines of focus? This 
would mean much labor in moving the heavy 
apparatus in what seemed a fruitless and 
costly experiment. But its uneasiness was 
caused by the saucy taunts of the decoys. 
Its wings were elevated slightly. It could not 
resist answering some of those rasping calls. 
The man behind the searchlight could be 
seen glistening with perspiration as he ‘‘fed”’ 
the carbons of the great are light. The 
writer’s fingers were upon the switch of the 
camera motor. Then the insect’s wings 
began to move rhythmically and another 
chant was added to the chorus of “katydid, 
katydid n’t,’”’ and so it continued until the 
picture was taken. And this picture has 
been seen by thousands of school children 
who never knew how insects ‘‘sing.”’ 
