GREAT GREEN GRASSTIOPPER. 247 



Dr. Kidd mentions in bis monograph that he often found tlie 

 hard and horny parts of various insects when dissecting tlie 

 digestive apparatus ; and another student of this curious insect 

 has stated that he fed a Mole Cricket for several months on ants. 

 Like other Crickets, the males are very quarrelsome, and fight 

 to the death, the victor always eating his conquered adversary. 

 The males appear to be much scarcer than the females, and 

 in them the right elytron laps over the left, whereas in the 

 females the reverse seems to be the case. The male in ay 

 also be known by the arrangement of the nervures of the 

 elytra and the notches of the large nervure of the right 

 wing-case. 



The eggs of the Mole Cricket are deposited under ground in 

 a cliamber about the size and shape of a hen's egg cut longitu- 

 dinally. This cell is dug near the surface of the ground, so 

 that the warmth of the sun can penetrate through the thin 

 covering of earth, while the eggs are perfectly concealed from 

 any ordinary foe. The eggs vary in number from one to four 

 hundi-ed, and are a greyish-yellow in colour. The wings being 

 small in proportion to the size of the body, the flight of the 

 Mole Cricket is in a succession of dips, like that of our 

 ordinary short-winged birds. 



We now come to another family, namely, the Gryllida, in 

 which are included the great bulk of the British Grasshoppers. 

 The word Gryllidce is taken from the Greek, and signifies ' a 

 murmurer,' in allusion to the familiar sound which is produced 

 by tlie males of most though not of all the species. 



In this family the antennae are long and very slender ; the 

 females are furnished with a sword-shaped ovipositor, and 

 the wing covers of the males have a talc-like spot at their 

 bases. Mostly both wings are furnished with these spots, but 

 in some species there is only one spot. There is, howevei', one 

 character which is common to both sexes, namely, the disposi- 

 tion of the wings and their covers, which, when the insect is at 

 rest, are laid along the back and elevated in the middle like a 

 slanting roof. These wing-covers often extend far beyond the 

 end of tiie body. 



Our best type of these insects is the Great Green Grass- 

 iiorrER (Aci-ida viridissima). This handsome insect has 



