90 FABRE'S BOOK OF INSECTS 



is the fact that he is a memorial of the remotest times. He 

 gives us a vague glimpse of habits now out of use. 



It was thanks to the Decticus that I first learnt one or 

 two things about young Grasshoppers. 



Instead of packing their eggs in casks of hardened foam, 

 like the Locust and the Mantis, or laying them in a twig 

 like the Cicada, Grasshoppers plant them like seeds in the 

 earth. 



The mother Decticus has a tool at the end of her body 

 with which she scrapes out a little hole in the soil. In this 

 hole she lays a certain number of eggs, then loosens the dust 

 round the side of the hole and rams it down with her tool, 

 very much as we should pack the earth in a hole with a stick. 

 In this way she covers up the well, and then sweeps and 

 smooths the ground above it. 



She then goes for a little walk in the neighbourhood, by 

 way of recreation. Soon she comes back to the place where 

 she has already laid her eggs, and, very near the original 

 spot, which she recognises quite well, begins the work afresh. 

 If I watch her for an hour I see her go through this whole 

 performance, including the short stroll in the neighbourhood, 

 no less than five times. The points where she lays the eggs 

 are always very close together. 



When everything is finished I examine the little pits. 

 The eggs lie singly, without any cell or sheath to protect 

 them. There are about sixty of them altogether, pale lilac- 

 grey in colour, and shaped like a shuttle. 



When I began to observe the ways of the Decticus I was 

 anxious to watch the hatching, so at the end of August I 

 gathered plenty of eggs, and placed them in a small glass jar 

 with a layer of sand. Without suffering any apparent change 

 they spent eight months there under cover, sheltered from the 

 frosts, the showers, and the overpowering heat of the sun, 

 which they would be obliged to endure out of doors. 



When June came, the eggs in my jar showed no sign of 

 being about to hatch. They were just as I had gathered 



