178 HOMES WITHOUT HANDS. 



specimens of the insect which made it, and can find nothing 

 which affords the least clew to the difficulty. 



There is no doubt as to the species of insect which made it, for 

 the creature lies inside, a small portion of the ends of the elytra 

 and part of one leg being visible through the fracture. The color 

 of the beetle is peculiarly beautiful, being rich dark chocolate, soft 

 and deep as made of velvet, and upon the thorax and round the 

 elytra are drawn broad streaks of creamy white. On account of 

 the large dimensions of the cocoon, it has necessarily been reduced 

 in size, but a common house-fly is introduced into the drawing, in 

 order to show the comparative size of the cocoon and the insect. 



Many of the Orthopterous insects are burrowers, either digging 

 holes wherein they themselves reside, or preparing a subterranean 

 habitation for their young. 



The best known and most important of these insects is the 

 Mole -cricket (Gryllotalpa vulgaris), called in some places the 

 Croaker, or Churr-worm, on account of the peculiar sound 

 which it produces. It is a truly wonderful insect — one of those 

 beings which, for the sake of force, we may perhaps call the anom- 

 alies of nature, though, in fact, nature is perfectly harmonious, and 

 can have no real anomalies. A cursory glance at the insect will 

 at once point out its habits, for the general shape, as well as the 

 strange development of the fore limbs, and the peculiar formation 

 of the first pair of feet, are so similar to the corresponding mem- 

 bers of the mole that the identity of their pursuits is at once evi- 

 dent. 



Like the mole, the insect passes nearly the whole of its life un- 

 derground, digging out long passages by means of its spade-like 

 limbs, and traversing them with some swiftness. Like the mole, 

 it is fierce and quarrelsome, is even ready to fight with its kind, 

 and, if victorious, always tears to pieces its vanquished opponent. 

 Like the mole, it is exceedingly voracious, and requires so much 

 food, that if several of them be confined in the same cage and 

 kept only for a short time without food, the strongest will fall 

 upon the weakest, kill and devour them. Like the mole, also, it 

 is useful enough in the fields, where its tunnels form a kind of 

 subsoil drainage, but it is equally destructive in the garden, work- 

 ing great havoc among young plants and flowers. One species 

 that inhabits Jamaica has done great damage to the young sugar- 

 canes soon after they had begun to shoot up. 



