The Green Grasshopper 



with the Decticus. Influenced by the general 

 diet of the Orthoptera, 1 those ruminants of 

 the greenswards, I offer the prisoners a leaf 

 of lettuce. They bite into it, certainly, but 

 very sparingly and with a scornful tooth. It 

 soon becomes plain that I am dealing with 

 half-hearted vegetarians. They want some- 

 thing else : they are beasts of prey, appar- 

 ently. But what manner of prey? A lucky 

 chance taught me. 



At break of day I was pacing up and down 

 outside my door, when something fell from 

 the nearest plane-tree with a shrill grating 

 sound. I ran up and saw a Grasshopper 

 gutting the belly of an exhausted Cicada. 

 In vain the victim buzzed and waved his 

 limbs : the other did not let go, dipping her 

 head right into the entrails and rooting them 

 out by small mouthfuls. 



I knew what I wanted to know : the attack 

 had taken place up above, early in the morn- 

 ing, while the Cicada was asleep; and the 

 plunging of the poor wretch, dissected alive, 

 had made assailant and assailed fall in a 



1 The order of insects comprising the Grasshoppers, 

 Locusts, Crickets, Cockroaches, Mantes and Earwigs. 

 The Cicada, with whom the present volume opens, and 

 the Foamy Cicadella, with whom it closes, belong to the 

 order of Homoptera. Translator's Note. 

 287 



