The Life of the Grasshopper 



bubble and called the mirror (mirau) in the 

 Provengal tongue. 



The church, the mirrors and the lids are 

 commonly regarded as the sound-producing 

 organs. Of a singer short of breath it is 

 said that he has cracked his mirrors (a U 

 mirau creba). Picturesque language says 

 the same thing of an uninspired poet. 

 Acoustics give the lie to the popular belief. 

 You can break the mirrors, remove the lids 

 with a cut of the scissors, tear the yellow 

 front membrane and these mutilations will 

 not do away with the Cicada's song: they 

 simply modify it, weaken it slightly. The 

 chapels are resonators. They do not pro- 

 duce sound, they increase it by the vibrations 

 of their front and back membranes; they 

 change it as their shutters are opened more 

 or less wide. 



The real organ of sound is seated else- 

 where and is not easy to find, for a novice. 

 On the other side of each chapel, at the ridge 

 joining the belly to the back, is a slit bounded 

 by horny walls and masked by the lowered 

 lid. Let us call it the window. This open- 

 ing leads to a cavity or sound-chamber deeper 

 than the adjacent chapel, but much less wide. 

 Immediately behind the attachment of the 

 60 



