X.) Ou the Courtship of certain Huropean Acridiue. 
By Professor Kpwarp B. Pourron, M.A., F.R.S., 
¥.1.S., ete. on 
[Read April Ist, 1896. ] 
THe extraordinarily fine and hot weather in Switzerland 
at the end of August and beginning of September last 
year (1895), was very favourable for the observations 
which are here recorded. I was then staying at the 
Weisshorn Hotel, high above Vissoye, in the Val 
d’Anniviers, 7690 feet in elevation. Certain species of 
Acridiide were excessively abundant in the immediate 
neighbourhood of the hotel, species moreover which 
afforded examples of very different methods of courtship. 
In working at this subject I received the greatest 
assistance from my two friends, Mr. F. Jenkinson and 
Mr. F. V. Dickins: their keen powers of observation 
enabled me to add many new facts of much interest, and 
also afforded valuable confirmation upon the most diffi- 
cult points. Mr. Jenkinson observed with me for hours 
together on several occasions, so that we were able to 
compare our impressions as we received them. 
Dr. Sharp has kindly identified the species for me, 
comparing my specimens with a Brunner collection at 
Cambridge. 
The object of this enquiry was to make out the 
methods employed by the males in the courtship of the 
females, and especially the part played by stridulation. 
Dr. Sharp, in the Cambridge Natural History (Vol. v., 
p. 286), insists on the insufficiency of observations on this 
point, and I therefore hope that this work has not been in 
vain. The following observations suggest that the true 
significance of the latter is tc be found in its use during 
courtship. In only a single species of those observed, 
Stethophyma fuscum, did the males commonly stridulate 
without reference to the females, and merely in rivalry 
with each other. In all the other sound-producing species 
the power seemed, almost without exception, to be 
TRANS. ENT. SOC. LOND. 1896.—PaRT 1. (JONE.) 16 
