HARDWICKE'S SCIENCE-GOSSIP. 



measured purl of the bubbles on the deep and 

 strong current. Do they not inspire an absolute terror 

 now, that would alarm the guilty conscience on a 

 lonely heath more than the churr of the fern owl and 

 the rattling and puffing of a thousand snakes ? Fill 

 up the cup with red wine and white wine, for he is a 

 merry prophet of a clearing shower, and old Hesiod 

 believed that such majestic notes, when presided 

 over by the dog-star, betokened a heavy crop of figs 

 and a cheerful vintage. Let us drink success to the 

 year, and no longer carp and cavil concerning the 

 phylloxera, the hail, and the driving cyclones. 

 Does the new wine inspire^ a moody sadness, the 

 flowers are sparse upon the meadows, the chestnuts 

 are scattering their husks, and this requiem of the 

 summer must indeed conclude with the literal death 

 of the performers. " Caesar," they seem to shout, " we 

 die." It would be quite useless under such absolutely 

 trying circumstances to cry Bravo, but if you seize a 

 hair-comb and sweep along it your finger-nail, the 

 chief musician will be sure to understand, for this 

 strange being is so quick of hearing. 



But why this dull and leaden silence ? The sports, 

 you see, are done, for the sun is sinking low, and a 

 sudden storm of dust and rain drives hitherward, 

 deadly, damp and cold. It will shake the pears from 

 off the bough, and quench, oh horrors, the last 

 sparkles of summer merriment. But what the deuce 

 can the matter be with Madam Locusta, the star of 

 our troop, who now dances out of the foliage for an 

 ovation, so sleek and so plump ? You would be 

 inclined to say that she had eaten her Signor from 

 sheer vexation or because he was by nature so very 

 green. 



Madam, who is more unassuming than a sheep, 

 and yet more cruel by far than a tiger, will now 

 improvise our epilogue, which runs as follows. In 

 happy ignorance, you mortals have too long con- 

 cluded that your vices were your own and that 

 innocence was to be learnt of us, the humbler works 

 of the creation, for man, conscious of his manifold 

 imperfection, has been ever ready to assume that 

 perfection, exists in everything around him. It is not 

 then surprising that we leaf-crickets, who can claw 

 and can bite, have by your popular writers been 

 confused with the harmless cicadse, for this mistake 

 might have originated in the occasional similarity of 

 our croaking, which is yet readily distinguishable in 

 its staccato notes ; but when, as sometimes happens, 

 you behold a portrait of myself, who indeed possess 

 no violin, but have all the feminine weakness 

 exemplified in a long ovipositor, presented to the 

 public gaze as that of the beloved one whose food is 

 ambrosia ; we players can but ridicule the artist who 

 has never witnessed our rural play of All for love, 

 which is enacted every year during the prevalence of 

 the Martinmas summer. 



It may interest the naturalist to observe that 

 Walckenser — who, in his " Faune Parisienne," alludes 



to the coupling of gnats, dragon-flies, ephemera and 

 scolopendras, as likewise to that of spiders, Cyclops, 

 crustacete and hydrachnae, and who'has so graphically 

 described the female flea reposing on the breast of her 

 partner, her mouth applied to his mouth, and her 

 feet intertwined with his — makes indeed no mention 

 of the equally fantastic coupling of the subjects of 

 this article. It is droll, to say the least, since, owing 

 to the presence of the afore-mentioned long oviposi- 

 tor, Nature has ordained that the female should have 

 the uppermost ; and as a consequence the happy 

 possessor of her who has inspired his lays, is either 

 hoisted into the air like a leg of mutton or ignomini- 

 ously dragged along on his back. It may be 

 likewise added that those few species of leaf-cricket 

 which inhabit Europe are easily kept in cages or 

 boxes covered with green gauze, since whatever may 

 be their habits when rambling at will over the 

 hedgerows, they, or at least their ladies, appear quite 

 content to dine, when in confinement, on a leaf of 

 lettuce or blade of grass, as the case may be. 



A word in recapitulation. That two things should 

 be alike and yet not alike is not mathematical, but it 

 is the case in point with Ephippiger vitium and 

 selligera. We notice a saddle-shaped thorax. The 

 notes of the male are heard every two seconds, and 

 the female, when in the proximity of her male, squeals 

 like a mouse or weasel ; but although the notes of 

 either move with like rapidity, those of setfigertz are 

 a sound of winding up, lasting for about two seconds, 

 whereas those of vitium are momentary and dashing. 

 Although formed alike, vitium is cast in the more 

 delicate mould, and perhaps, we might add, the 

 most specialized. Their sense of hearing is most 

 strange ; I once heard one of these creatures respond 

 to the laugh of a saucy girl who was passing. 



THE SIROCCO AS A DISINTEGRATING 

 AGENT, WITH SPECIAL REFERENCE 

 TO ITS EFFECT ON THE STRATA OF 

 THE MALTESE ISLANDS. 



By John H. Cooke, B.Sc, F.G.S. 



WIND as an agent of denudation now takes its 

 place among the most potent of those forces 

 of Nature that are at present operating on the earth's 

 crust, and assisting to modify the contour of its 

 outline. 



The extent of the work which it is capable of 

 effecting, however, is not to be measured by the 

 amount of violence or power that it exerts ; for the 

 most stupendous changes are often brought about by 

 the instrumentality of the most insignificant causes, 

 and what the hurricane with all of its might is 

 powerless to effect, the zephyr, if it be but allowed a 

 sufficiency of time, can do without appreciable efiort. 



Of the most unobtrusive, and at the same time the 

 most effective of the numerous agents that are engaged 



