NOISES OF INSECTS. 489 
without interrupting its song. The giant cock-roach (Blatta gigantea) 
which abounds in old timber houses in the warmer parts of the world 
makes a noise when the family are asleep like a pretty smart rapping with 
the knuckles — three or four sometimes appearing to answer each other. 
On this account, in the West Indies it is called the Drummer ; and they 
sometimes beat such a reveille, that only good sleepers can rest for them? 
As the animals of this genus generally come forth in the night for the pur- 
pose of feeding, this noise is probably connected with that object. 
Insects also, at least many of the social ones, emit peculiar noises while 
engaged in their various employments. If an ear be applied to a wasps’ or 
humble-bees’ nest, or a bee-hive, a hum more or less intense may always 
be perceived. Were I disposed to play upon your credulity, I might tell 
you with Geedart, that in every humble-bees’ nest there is a trumpeter, 
who early in the morning, ascending to its summit, vibrates his wings, and 
sounding his trumpet for the space of a quarter of an hour, rouses the in- 
habitants to work! But since Reaumur could never witness this, I shalt 
not insist upon your believing it, though the relater declares that he had 
heard it with his ears, and seen it with his eyes, and had called many to 
witness the vibrating and strepent wings of this trumpeter humble-bee.* 
The blue sand-wasp (Ammophila? cyanea), which at all other times is 
silent, when engaged in building its cells, emits a singular but pleasing 
sound, which may be heard at ten or twelve yards’ distance.® 
Some insects also are remarkable for a peculiar mode of calling, com- 
manding, or giving an alarm. I have before mentioned the noise made by 
the neuters or soldiers amongst the white ants, by which they keep the 
labourers, who answer it by a hiss, upon the alert and to their work. 
This noise, which is produced by striking any substance with their man- 
dibles, Smeathman describes as a small vibrating sound, rather shriller and 
quicker than the ticking of a watch. It could be distinguished he says at 
the distance of three or four feet, and continued for a minute at a time 
with very short intervals. When any one walks in a solitary grove, where 
the covered ways of these insects abound, they give the alarm by a loud 
hissing, which is heard at every step.t—‘ When house-crickets are out,” 
says Mr. White, “ and running about in a room in the night, if surprised by 
acandle, they give two or three shrill notes, as it were for a signal to their 
followers, that they may escape to their crannies and lurking-holes to avoid 
danger.” ® . 
Under this head I shall consider a noise before alluded to, which has 
been a cause of alarm and terror to the superstitious in allages. You will 
perceive that Iam speaking of the death-watch— so called, because it emits 
a sound resembling the ticking of a watch, supposed to predict the death of 
some one of the family in the house in which it is heard, Thus sings the 
muse of the witty Dean of St. Patrick on this subject : 
eh et es ees CAS woOd=Wworm 
That lies in old wood, like a hare in her form: 
_—————————— a 
1 Drury’s Tnsects, iii. Preface. 
2 Lister’s Gadart, 244. Compare Reaum. vi. 30. 
5 Bingley, Animal Biogr. iii, 1st ed. 835. Mr. Westwood has also observed the 
same peculiarity in Ammophila hirsuta whilst similarly engaged. 
4 Philos. Trans. 1781, 48, 38, 5 Nat. Hist. ii, 262. 
