360 SUPPLEMENT 



ther character peculiar to these insects, and which has not 

 been accorded to them without a useful purpose. We have 

 already mentioned that their Latin name designates the 

 faculty possessed by the insect of leaping or raising itself into 

 the air, as it were by a sort of spring, when it is placed upon 

 its back, and never otherwise. It leaps perpendicularly to a 

 certain height, so that it falls pretty nearly in the same spot 

 in which it had been placed. Its object in making this leap 

 is to replace itself on its feet, which would otherwise prove a 

 painful and difficult operation, in consequence of the short- 

 ness of its limbs. If it falls again upon the back, which not 

 seldom happens, it reiterates its leaps until it finds itself upon 

 its feet. Having explained the object of these leaps, we 

 shall enter a little into the mechanism by which they are per- 

 formed, as it has been but slightly noticed in the text. 



The two external angles of the corslet are terminated in 

 advanced, and more or less sharp points. Underneath, and 

 exactly at the middle of the posterior edge, a third point, 

 long, stiff, and very hard, placed on the same line with the 

 body, advances towards the breast considerably below the 

 edge of the corslet. This part, broad at its origin, dimi- 

 nishes in thickness by little and little to terminate in a 

 blunt, or but triflingly rounded point. Underneath, and 

 near its extremity, is remarked a small eminence in the form 

 of a denticulation. On the breast underneath, between its 

 anterior edge and the two intermediate feet, is found an oval 

 hole, tolerably deep, furnished with a smooth and corneous 

 substance. It is in this cavity that the long point of the 

 corslet is sunk, when the insect lowers its head, which is its 

 natural position, either in walking or in a state of repose. 

 Such are the principal instruments which the elater employs 

 to raise itself into the air. The following is the manner in 

 which this little manoeuvre is performed ; the insect placed 

 upon its back, lowers the head and corslet towards the plain 



