282 GRASS AND TREE-HOPPERS. 



representative of surpassing bliss, deserving the apostrophe of 



" Happy insect ! what can be 

 In happiness compared to thee ? " 



But know you not, says the entomologist, that these lines of 

 Anacreon have been only by error and mistranslation assigned 

 to the English grasshopper, at cost of the Grecian tree-hopper, 

 to whom they properly belong ? True ; but if we examine, 

 somewhat entomologically , the well-known ode commencing 

 with the above couplet, we shall perhaps find that each of the 

 attributes, real or figurative, which it assigns to the classic song- 

 ster of the tree, suit as well, and some of them much better, our 

 rustic songster of the grass. 



This felicity, without pretending to decide on its compaia- 

 tive or positive amount, we may fairly suppose to be tolerably 

 equal with the hoppers of the tree and of the grass. 



" Fed with nourishment divine, 

 The dewy morning's gentle wine, 

 Nature waits upon thee still, 

 And thy verdant cup does fill ; 

 "Tis filled wherever thou dost tread, 

 Nature's self thy Ganymede ! " 



This may be said no less truly than prettily of both our sum- 

 mer minstrels, only with reservation. Both, doubtless, take a 

 similar delight in quaffing the " morning's gentle wine," the 

 one, from the emerald salver of a leaf, the other, from the 

 golden chalice of a buttercup ; but, as vegetable feeders, both 

 of no mean appetite, this " nourishment divine " would, by 

 itself, serve them only poorly. And as for the tree-hopper, one 

 of the uses of the gimlet-like tool with which it is provided is 

 said to be that of tapping trees, after the manner of house- 

 wives tapping birches for their sappy wine. 



Be it noticed, however, by the way, that neither foreigner 

 nor native are vocal, but, in reality instrumental performers. 

 Thus considered, the grasshopper is as a shepherd with his 

 Pandean reeds, or pipe and tabor, and the tree-hopper, by all 



