that one must look at him twice to make sure it 

 is he, and not some unknown minstrel from a dis- 

 tant shore. 



Insefts are the autumn singers and take the 

 place of birds and frogs. The crickets are as mu- 

 sical in their way as the thrush family, though 

 provided with but indifferent instruments. When 

 you consider that these crickets and locusts will 

 express themselves — will fill the day with song — 

 though they are without vocal organs and must 

 perforce do with legs and wings instead, you must 

 respedt them as musicians. It is a distindlly abo- 

 riginal music as compared with that of the birds, 

 as tom-toms and pipes are to violins and cellos. 

 And yet it is rhythmic withal and not wanting in 

 sweetness. Contrast these merry crickets with the 

 silent spider. There is no song in the annals of 

 her race. She is unsocial and unmusical like the 

 savage birds of prey. Yet before bees and birds 

 had appeared on the earth there were crickets 

 chirping. Theirs is the most ancient chant of the 

 world — the Song of Sex. 



Autumn nights are melodious with a voice, 

 which in the distance is so like that of the hyla of 

 early spring, though softer and more throbbing, 



51 



