286 MOONLIGHT MUSIC 



a series of sounds following so rapidly that they 

 blend into one sustained chord of sound; whereas 

 in this insect the points or drops of sound are heard 

 distinctly as separate notes. Several American 

 writers have tried to describe it; thus Thoreau called 

 it "slumberous breathing," and Hawthorne more 

 successfully describes it as "audible silence," and 

 adds: "If moonlight could be heard it would sound 

 like that." 



This is good, except that it omits a quality of the 

 sound which is its principal charm its expression. 

 That is, its tenderness, a quality which we find in 

 some bird music our willow wren is an example 

 but do not find in other insect music. It is the 

 most melancholy of all delicate sounds in nature; 

 and because of its slow sadness and musicalness you 

 might imagine it to be a human sound, although not 

 a vocal one. Let us say, of a once human wood- 

 haunting solitary minstrel, now faded and dwindled 

 away to an almost unsubstantial entity, who no 

 longer walks the earth but dwells in trees where 

 he has taken the colour and semi-transparence of the 

 leaves he lives with; that at night time, when the 

 moon sheds a misty silveriness on the dusky foliage, 

 he wakes once more to memories of long-dead human 

 affections, and with moth-like fingers sweeps the 

 strings, drawing out those soft, low, yet clear penetra- 

 tive sounds that make the silence deeper, and float 

 down to us like the sound of tears. 



So far we have only considered insect music of the 

 highest kind in which sound is not only produced 



