14 CANNIBAL GRASSHOPPERS. 



ing rumination, which, many have considered an actual chew- 

 ing of the cud ; whereas it is opined by others, that, instead 

 of ruminating, like Mistress Colly, the Sieur Gryllus thinks 

 of nothing but of licking, like Miss Grimalkin, his superb 

 whiskers (otherwise antennas) and his paws, an operation 

 performed, by the way, with a tongue not at all dissimilar in 

 shape to the unruly member boasted by ourselves. Whether 

 or not chewers of the cud, grasshoppers are, decidedly, crop- 

 pers of the grass ; but we are assured, on good authority, that 

 they now and then are nothing scrupulous in the variation of 

 such Brahminian fare, by taking, as a relish, some innocent 

 little insect of a kind differing from themselves ; still worse, 

 that when made fellow-prisoners (hard pressed by hunger or 

 confinement) they have been known to commit the cannibal 

 enormity of devouring one another an example being given 

 wherein one of the gentler sex (which, by the way, among 

 insects is usually the fiercer) was the doer of the deed. But, 

 worst of all ! horror of horrors ! we have it on excellent 

 evidence, how that a certain great green grasshopper (one of 

 the sort just described) on being bottled up together with his 

 own leg (accidentally detached), did make a hearty meal off 

 that late portion of himself. The reverend naturalist by 

 whom this unnatural act is recorded, performed, himself, what 

 in some prejudiced opinions might appear a crowning feat 

 of horror. He followed the example of the Acridophagi, and 

 pronounced, on experience, the large green grasshopper of 



