386 NOISES OF INSECTS. 



tions, elicit from insects occasionally certain sounds. 

 Fear, anger, sorrow, joy, or love and desire, they express 

 in particular instances by particular noises. I shall 

 begin with those which they emit when under any alarm. 

 One larva only is recorded as uttering a cry of alarm, 

 and it produces a perfect insect remarkable for the same 

 faculty : I allude to Acherontia Atropos. Its caterpillar, 

 if disturbed at all, draws back rapidly, making at the 

 same time a rather loud noise, which has been compared 

 to the crack of an electric spark a . You would scarcely 

 think that any quiescent pupa could show their fears by 

 a sound, yet in one instance this appears to be the 

 case. De Geer having made a small incision in the 

 cocoon of a moth, which included that of its parasite 

 Ichneumon (/. Cantator, De G.), the insect concealed 

 within the latter uttered a little cry, similar to the chirp- 

 ing of a small grasshopper, continuing it for a long time 

 together. The sound was produced by the friction of 

 its body against the elastic substance of its own cocoon, 

 and was easily imitated by rubbing a knife against its 

 surface h . 



But to come to perfect insects. Many beetles when 

 taken show their alarm by the emission of a shrill, sibi- 

 lant, or creaking sound which some compare to the 

 chirping of young birds produced by rubbing their 

 elytra with the extremity of their abdomen. This is the 

 case with the dung-chafers (Gcotrupes vernalis, stercora- 

 rius, and Copris lunaris] ; with the carrion-chafer (Trox 

 sabulosus) ; and others of the lamellicorn beetles. The 

 burying-beetle (Necrophorus Vespillo)^ Lcma melanopa 

 and merdigem, and Hygrobia Hermanni, and many 

 * Fuessl. J;r/m>. 8, 10. b DeGeer, vii. 594. 



