264 Insect Architecture. 



CHAPTER XIII. 



STRUCTURES OF GRASSHOPPERS, CRICKETS, AND BEETLES. 



p RASSHOPPERS, locusts, crickets, and beetles are, in 

 VT many respects, no less interesting than the insects 

 whose architectural proceedings we have already detailed. 

 They do not, indeed, build any edifice for the accommodation 

 of themselves or their progeny ; but most, if not all of them, 

 excavate retreats in walls or in the ground. 



The house-cricket ( Acheta domestica) is well known for its 

 habit of picking out the mortar of ovens and kitchen fire- 

 places, where it not only enjoys warmth, but can procure 

 abundance of food. It is usually supposed that it feeds on 

 bread. M. Latreille says it only eats insects, and it certainly 

 thrives well in houses infested by the cockroach ; but we 

 have also known it eat and destroy lamb's-wool stockings, 

 and other wollen stuffs, hung near a fire to dry. It is 

 evidently not fond of hard labour, but prefers those places 

 where the mortar is already loosened, or at least is new, soft, 

 and easily scooped out ; and in this way it will dig covert 

 ways from room to room. In summer, crickets often make 

 excursions from the house to the neighbouring fields, and 

 dwell in the crevices of rubbish, or the cracks made in the 

 ground by dry weather, where they chirp as merrily as in 

 the snuggest chimney-corner. Whether they ever dig 

 retreats in such circumstances we have not ascertained : 

 though it is not improbable they may do so for the purpose 

 of making nests. M. Bory St. Vincent tells us that the 

 Spaniards are so fond of crickets that they keep them in 

 cages like singing birds.* 



* Diet. Classique d'Hist. Nat. Art. Grillon. 



