ORTHOPTERA OF NOVA SCOTIA. PIERS. 3 17 



have often stood near the dark alder thickets, in the calm 

 close nights of August and September, listening to them and 

 the wide-spread continuous undertone from thousands of 

 tiny Crickets among the short grass of the adjacent pasture 

 land, and I could not but have some admiration for the 

 bold, fierce nature which the former's passionate challenge 

 seemed to indicate in those lurking green-clad bushmen, 

 though one could never grow to love them like the little 

 Cricket whose softer serenade lulls rather than arouses. 



Its notes are first heard near Halifax about 9th August 

 (8 Aug. '97, 28 July '04, 8 Aug. '09, 12 Aug. '10, 1 Aug. '11, 

 17 Aug. '16, 19 Aug. '17), a week after the first cricket is 

 heard, and are common throughout that month and Septem- 

 ber. They are last heard about 20th October (17 Oct. '95, 

 2*1 Oct. '15), about the time of the first hard frost which 

 usually occurs in this province near 16th October. 



Strange to say, while the species is so very common and 

 its notes must be so very audible to all, j'et it has received 

 no vernacular name here; and in fact I have not found anj^one 

 but a naturalist who has ever seen the inject, and great 

 surprise is expressed at its appearance when a captured 

 specimen is shown. 



21. Scudderia curvicauda borealis Rehn and Hebard. 

 Broad-winged Curved-tailed Katydid. 



Description. — This geographic race closely resembles S. pisiillata in 

 general appearance, and the form of the supra-anal spine of the male is also 

 generally similar, except a slight difference in the shape of the branches of 

 the spine.— Supra-anal spin^ forked, the apical notch acute and shallow, with- 

 out a median tooth; the lateral processes (on sides of n tch) suhequol in 

 width (not tapering) and somewhat rounded at end when viewed from above, 

 the underside of these processes bearing a small vertical longitudinal flange or 

 keel. Wing-covers proportionately rather narroio (the length about 4^4 times 

 the greatest breadth in male and about 4J^ in female). Greatest width of 

 ovipositor about one-half of its upper chord. Hind femora about 20.2 to 

 22.6 mm. Disk of pronotum wider posteriorily than anteriorly, the former 

 being 1.4 of the latter. 



From pistillnta it may be separated by the larger eyes, much narrower 

 wing-covers (65 to 7 mm. in male boreaHa, as compared with 9 to 11 mm. in 

 male pidillata), somewhat longer hind femora, much smaller tympanal area 

 of the male -wing-covers, and the sub-equal width of the branches of the supra- 



