492 NOISES OF INSECTS. 
insects occasionally certain sounds. Fear, anger, sorrow, joy, or love and 
desire, they express in particular instances by particular noises. I shall 
begin with those which they emit when under any alarm. One /arva only 
is recorded as uttering a cry of alarm, and it produces a perfect insect re- 
markable for the same faculty : I allude to Acherontia Alropos. Its cater- 
pillar, if disturbed at all, draws back rapidly, making at the same time a 
rather loud noise, which has been compared to the crack of an electric 
spark,! » You would scarcely think that any quiescent pupe could show their 
fears by a sound,—yet in one instance this appears to be the case. De 
Geer haying made a small incision in the cocoon of a moth, which in- 
cluded that of its parasite Ichneumon (J. cantator De G.), the insect con- 
cealed within the latter uttered a little cry, similar to the chirping of a small 
grasshopper, continuing it for a long time together. The sound was pro- 
duced by the friction of its body against the elastic substance of its own 
cocoon, and was easily imitated by rubbing a knife against its surface.* 
But to come to perfect insects. Many beetles when taken show their 
alarm by the emission of a shrill, sibilant, or creaking sound—which some 
compare to the chirping of young birds—produced by rubbing their elytra 
with the extremity of their abdomen. ‘This is the case with the dung- 
chafers (Geotrupes vernalis, stercorarius, and Copris lunaris); with the 
carrion-chafer (Zrow sabulosus) ; and others of the lamellicorn beetles. The 
burying-beetle ( Necrophorus Vespillo), Crioceris melanopa and merdigera, and 
Hygrobia Hermanni, and many other Coleoptera, produce a similar noise by 
the same means. When this noise is made, the movement of the abdomen 
may be perceived; and if a pin is introduced under the elytra it ceases. 
Long after many of these insects are dead the noise may be caused by 
pressure.  Rosel found this with respect to the Scarabeide*, and I have 
repeated the experiment with success upon Necrophorus Vespillo. The 
capricorn tribes (Prionus, Lamia, Cerambyx, &c.) emit under alarm an 
acute or creaking sound—which Lister calls querulous, and Dumeril com- 
pares to the braying of an ass*—by the friction of the thorax, which they 
alternately elevate and depress, against the neck, and sometimes against 
the base of the elytra.® On account of this, Prionus coriarius is called the 
Jiddler in Germany.’ Two other coleopterous genera, Cychrus and Clytus, 
make their cry of Noli me tangere by rubbing their thorax against the base 
of the elytra. Pimelia, another beetle, does the same by the friction of its 
legs against each other.? And, doubtless, many more Coleoptera, if ob- 
served, would be found to express their fears by similar means. 
In the other orders the examples of cries of terror are much less nume- 
rous. A bug (Cimew subapterus De G.) when taken emits a sharp sound, 
probably with its rostrum, by moving its head up and down.8 Ray makes 
a similar remark with respect to another bug (Reduvius personatus), the 
cry of which he compares to the chirping of a grasshopper.® Mutilla 
Europea, a hymenopterous insect, makes a sibilant chirping, as 1 once ob- 
1 Fuessl. Archiv. 8.10. Mr. Raddon assures me that on one occasion taking up 
the caterpillar of another moth, Gastropacha quercifolia, by the hairs, it uttered a 
distinct squeak. 
2 De Geer, vii, 594, 
5 Résel IT. 208. 
4 Ray, Hist. Ins. 884. Dumeril, Trait, Zlément. ii. 100. n. 17. 
5 De Geer, v. 58. 69. Résel, II. iii. 5. 6 Résel, ibid. 
7 Latr. Hist. Nat. x. 264, 8 De Geer, iii, 289. ® Hist, Ins, 56. 
