The Life of the Grasshopper 



to hear it and to discover at last where the 

 insect lies hidden. 



In our part of the world, we do not have 

 the House Cricket, that denizen of bakers' 

 shops and rural fireplaces. But, though the 

 crevices under the hearthstones in my village 

 are silent, the summer nights make amends 

 by filling the country-side with a charming 

 symphony unknown in the north. Spring, 

 during its sunniest hours, has the Field 

 Cricket as its musician; the calm summer 

 nights have the Italian Cricket (CEcanthus 

 pellucens, Scop.). One diurnal, the other 

 nocturnal, they share the fine weather be- 

 tween them. By the time that the first has 

 ceased to sing, it is not long before the other 

 begins his serenade. 



The Italian Cricket has not the black 

 dress and the clumsy shape characteristic of 

 the family. He is, on the contrary, a slender, 

 fragile insect, quite pale, almost white, as 

 beseems his nocturnal habits. You are afraid 

 of crushing him, if you merely take him in 

 your fingers. He leads an aerial existence 

 on shrubs of every kind, or on the taller 

 grasses; and he rarely descends to earth. 

 His song, the sweet music of the still, hot 

 evenings from July to October, begins at 



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