FIELD-CEICKETS. 255 



of the month of May to the middle of July ; and in hot 

 weather, when they are most vigorous, they make the hills 

 echo ; and in the still hours of darkness, may be heard to a 

 considerable distance. In the beginning of the season, 

 their notes are more faint and inward ; but become louder 

 as the summer advances, and so die away again by degrees. 



Sounds do not always give us pleasure according to their 

 sweetness and melody ; nor do harsh sounds always displease. 

 "We are more apt to be captivated or disgusted with the 

 associations which they promote, than with the notes them- 

 selves. Thus the shrilling of the field-cricket, though sharp 

 and stridulous, yet marvellously delights some hearers, filling 

 their minds with a train of summer ideas of every thing that 

 is rural, verdurous, and joyous. 



About the 10th of March, the crickets appear at the 

 mouths of their cells, which they then open and bore, and 

 shape very elegantly. All that ever I have seen at that 

 season were in their pupa state, and had only the rudiments 

 of wings lying under a skin, or coat, which must be cast 

 before the insect can arrive at its perfect state:* from 

 whence I should suppose that the old ones of last year do 

 not always survive the winter. In August their holes begin 

 to be obliterated, and the insects are seen no more till 

 spring. 



JS"ot many summers ago, I endeavoured to transplant a 

 colony to the terrace in my garden, by boring deep holes in 

 the sloping turf. The new inhabitants stayed some time, 

 and fed and sung ; but wandered away by degrees, and were 

 heard at a farther distance every morning ; so that it 

 appears that on this emergency, they made use of their 

 wings in attempting to return to the spot from which they 

 were taken. 



One of these crickets, when confined in a paper cage, and 

 set in the sun, and supplied with plants moistened with 

 water, will feed and thrive, and become so merry and loud 

 as to be irksome in the same room where a person is sitting : 

 if the plants are not wetted, it will die. 



* We have observed that they cast these skins in April, which are then seen 

 lying at the mouths of their holes. 



