150 A NATURE WOOING. 



and compressed ; that of the males one and a quarter 

 inches in length; of the females nearly two inches. 

 The head is long and projects upward in the form of 

 a pyramid, the face being extremely sloping. The 

 antennae are flat and broad at base and taper 

 towards the apex. The tegmina, or outer wings, are 

 very short and narrow, their maximum length being 

 but about one-fifth of an inch. This locust has been 

 recorded only from one or two points in Florida. 

 Here it is common on the clumps of wire grass, in 

 sandy places along the edges of woodland paths and 

 old fields. Its short wings prevent it from flying, and 

 as it is but a poor leaper, it is readily taken with the 

 fingers. It relies upon protective mimicry as its chief 

 mode of defense; hence its organs of locomotion, 

 wings and legs, have developed but little, the former 

 being mere pads, the latter very slender and used 

 mainly for walking and for clasping the stems of 

 grass. The brown, linear body, when extended 

 lengthwise along a dead grass stem is scarcely notice- 

 able, so closely does its hue correspond to that of the 

 grass. The insect remains motionless until about to 

 be seized, when it sometimes gives a short leap to one 

 side. 



The number of colonies of the young of the lubber 

 grasshopper, Dictyophorus reticulaius Thunb., has 

 greatly increased during the past week, and some of 

 the earlier ones hatched are past the third moult. 

 Usually fifty to seventy-five of the young are on a 



