44 PLATE CCCCIX. 



Few infe6ts are more familiar than the common Cricket. It 

 frequents houfes, and is fuperftitioufly efteemed by many a welcome 

 inmate. 



This little animal is not only fond of warmth, but, as though an 

 almoft intenfe and fuffocating heat were abfolutely neceffary to its 

 very being, it is conftantly found moft abundantly in bakehoufes, 

 kitchen chimnies, and other places where the greateft heats prevail. 

 Befides the inacceffibility of its lurking places in general, nothing has 

 more fully contributed to the prefervation of thofe infects than the 

 filly veneration which the vulgar entertain for it; interpreting its 

 prefence as an omen of good fortune, and conceiving it would be un- 

 propitious to harm or deftroy it. 



The Cricket is indeed an animal of inoffenfive manners ; it is trou- 

 blefome only from the inceffancy of its chirping, which continues 

 without intermiffion night and day. Some think its note louder 

 before rain than at any other time; a circumftance afferted both by 

 Linnaeus and Fabricius. Geoffroy fays, this noife is occafioned by 

 the friction of its thorax againft the head and wing-cafes. According 

 to Poda, the Cricket deferts houfes infefted with the cock roach, and 

 is deftroyed by pills of arfenic and the frefh root of the daucus mixed, 

 with flour, or the root of the nymphaaa boiled in milk. 



PLATE 



