REPORT OF THE ENTOMOLOGIST, 



25 



the insect is trilling be slightly struck by the hand, it will stop its 

 musical serenade instantly and remain mute for some time. The per- 

 fect insect appears in May and June, and lasts until late in autumn; 

 it is of a green color, shaded "with brown. The outer edge of the wings 

 is also green, and when the cicada is young and vigorous, it appears to 

 be covered with a whitish dust or powder, which gradually disappears 

 as the insect grows older. The female deposits her eggs in slits or 

 incisions made in trees or plants, which she cuts with her ovipositor. 

 The eggs remain in these longitudinal incisions for some time, accord- 

 ing to tbo warmth of the season ; when hatched by the heat of the 

 sun, the young larva3 drop to the ground, and immediately bury them- 

 selves in the soil, feeding upon tender subterranean roots, which they 

 pierce with their beak and then suck out the sap. It is a popular but 

 erroneous idea that the females of this cicada are capable of piercing 

 the skin of mankind and then ejecting a x)oisonous fluid into the wound, 

 producing violent inflammation and pain. The insect itself is frequent- 

 ly carried off by a large burrowing wasp or hornat, {^tinis speciosus,) 

 which forms deep holes or burrows in the earth, where it deposits its 

 egg or eggs in a half-killed cicada, which is intended to form a supply 

 of fresh food for the larva until it changes into the pupa state, when it 

 ceases altogether to feed until it emerges as a perfect v/asp or hornet. 

 Last season many specimens of this stirus were brought to the Depart- 

 ment, having been caught in the very act of carrying still living harvest- 

 flies to their burrows. The manna of druggists is said to be the concrete 

 juice of a species of Fraxinus, or ash, in flakes, which is produced by a 

 species of cicada, or, most probably, some other insect of the suborder 

 Homoptera. The insects themselves are destroyed in great numbers by 

 hogs, x)oultry, and various small animals ; but as they nev^r appear in 

 such immense numbers as their relatives, the seventeen-year locust, they 

 do very little, if any, damage to the farmer. 



Cicada sepiendecim, or the seventeen-year locust, derives its specific 

 name from the fact that it makes its appearance No. 2. 



in certain districts at stated intervals of seven- 

 teen years in immense numbers, when the mil- 

 lions of them, swarming on the forest and fruit 

 trees, almost deafen the observer with their 

 trilling calls to the females, and form an abund- 

 ant feast to the swine, fowls, &c., and wild ani- 

 mals on the land, and, if near a river or lake, to 

 the fishes in the water. They sometimes injure 

 fruit and forest trees by making their longitudi- 

 nal slits or incisions in the young branches or 

 terminal twigs, in which to deposit their eggs, 

 many of the branches thus injured dying down 

 as far as the injury, and afterward being broken 

 off by high winds and literally almost covering 

 the ground. The perfect insects make their 

 appearance the last of Mayor beginning of June 

 in immense swarms, and the earth in certain 

 localities is literally honey-combed with the 

 round holes which are made by the insects when 

 issuing from the earth, these holes being bored 

 sometimes through the hardest ground, and 

 sometimes even through well-traveled country 

 roads. After i)airing, the females deposit their 

 eggs, from ten to twenty or more, in longitudinal slitSj made, in pairs, 



