The Life of the Grasshopper 



Their existence in the air is more easily 

 calculated. I hear the first Cicadas at the 

 approach of the summer solstice. The 

 orchestra attains its full strength a month 

 later. A few laggards, very few and very 

 far between, continue to execute their faint 

 solos until the middle of September. That 

 is the end of the concert. As they do not 

 all come out of the ground at the same 

 period, it is obvious that the singers of Sep- 

 tember are not contemporary with those of 

 June. If we strike an average between 

 these two extreme dates, we shall have about 

 five weeks. 



Four years of hard work underground 

 and a month of revelry in the sun: this then 

 represents the Cicada's life. Let us no 

 longer blame the adult for his delirious tri- 

 umph. For four years, in the darkness, he 

 has worn a dirty parchment smock; for four 

 years he has dug the earth with his mattocks; 

 and behold the mud-stained navvy suddenly 

 attired in exquisite raiment, possessed of 

 wings that rival the bird's, drunk with the 

 heat and inundated with light, the supreme 

 joy of this world ! What cymbals could ever 

 be loud enough to celebrate such felicity, so 

 richly earned and so ephemeral ! 



112 



