LETTER XLVIII. 



To the same. 



SELBORNE. 



OW diversified are the modes of life not only of 

 incongruous but even of congenerous animals; 

 and yet their specific distinctions are not more 

 various than their propensities. Thus while the 

 field-cricket delights in sunny dry banks, and the 

 house-cricket rejoices amidst the glowing heat of 

 the kitchen hearth or oven, the Gryllus gryllotalpa 

 (the mole-cricket), haunts moist meadows, and frequents the sides of 

 ponds and banks of streams, performing all its functions in a swampy 

 wet soil. With a pair of fore-feet curiously adapted to the purpose, 

 it burrows and works under ground like the mole, raising a ridge as 

 it proceeds, but seldom throwing up hillocks. 



As mole-crickets often infest gardens by the side of canals, they 

 are unwelcome guests to the gardener, raising up ridges in their 

 subterraneous progress, and rendering the walks unsightly. If they 

 take to the kitchen quarters they occasion great damage among the 

 plants and roots, by destroying whole beds of cabbages, young 

 legumes, and flowers. When dug out they seem very slow and help- 

 less, and make no use of their wings by day ; but at night they come 

 abroad, and make long excursions, as I have been convinced by finding 



