the flat-leaf aspect of the wings. But the effect in this case is less strongly- 

 mimetic, for the body presents a less leaf-like surface than the wings, especially 

 in its lack of venation. Indeed, some of the green grasshoppers have scarcely 

 more than a general obliterative equipment of counter shading and foliage- 

 color. 



The next family of Orthoptera, the Grillida or crickets, have less to show 

 in the way of disguising-costumes. Mainly nocturnal, and in many cases 

 subterranean and fossorial, they largely lack highly developed colors and 

 patterns. Most of them are black, blackish, or brown, — ^monochrome, without 

 pronounced obliterative shading. Diurnal kinds, which stay above ground, 

 wiU doubtless all prove to be obliteratively shaded, though still dull-tinted, 

 —very few (or perhaps none) of them sharing the livelier coloration common 

 among their relatives the locusts and grasshoppers. 



The cockroaches and earwigs {Blattida and ForficulidcB) are likewise 

 nocturnal — shy and seclusive haunters of dark holes — and their protective 

 coloration amounts, apparently, to little or nothing beyond a general dull, 

 earthy brownness of tint. 



The Coleoptem, or beetles, in the adult state,* are, for the most part, tough, 

 hard, and shelly, and probably less welcome food, to the majority of insect- 

 eating animals, than are caterpillars, locusts and grasshoppers. Many of 

 them, moreover, are equipped with rank defensive (?) stenches, as well as with 

 strong biting jaws; and many are nocturnal — skulking by day under stones, 

 under rotten bark, or in other safe retreats. Considering beforehand all these 

 facts, we should not expect to find beetles, as a class, particularly well pro- 

 vided with disguising-costumes ; and they certainly are less so than some of the 

 more ' succulent ' tribes of insect. On the other hand, they are by no means im- 

 mune from enemies, nor do they, in the great majority of cases, lack oblitera- 

 tive coloration. Few have simple obliterative shading, as few have the regular 

 perching-habits, the habitual ' same-side-up-ness,' indispensable to the full 



* Their larvas almost all live hidden away from the daylight, and are as a rule monochrome 

 and patternless, — often colorless. 



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