THE TRIP OF THE SEASON: OR THE PHANTOM 



CICADA. 



By a. H. Swinton. 



It is the 18th July, 1882, and I am sitting in a railway carriage 

 listening to the reverberation of the steam-pnfFs adown the vacant 

 vistas of a right royal deer park. Suddenly the sepulchral voices of 

 two old cronies arise in the next compartment, where I had not 

 hitherto perceived that any one was sitting. " Is this Lyndhurst 

 Road, mum ? " " It is, mum." " Looks fearful stormy, mum T " It 

 looks awful, mum." "Terrible for the schools out here, mum?" 

 " It's fearful, mum." 



Things at the worst are sure to mend, thought I. And here I am 

 once again stretched on the green-sward beneath my magnificent old 

 Hampshire oaks, eating my sandwich in the sweet country air, and 

 reclining for a moment to watch the low scud drive along beneath a 

 high-stretched curtain of thunder-cloud and blue. But hush ! what 

 can that be just now stirring over-head ? Hark ! hark ! Tree 1 

 tree ! And now again the sound comes, tree ! Bless me, can that 

 be the voice of Cicada anglica, alias Melampsalta cicadetta ; said on 

 German authority to be not unlike the sound of the Jew's harp, or the 

 two full E's of the new harpsichord. Am I awake or asleep ? Tree ! 

 tree ! most classical music, tree ! tree ! I will think no more 

 about it ; these harsh jay-like notes may have been the dying 

 minstrelsy of the last of the Cicada, or the tender modulations of a 

 bird voice inspired by so beautiful a sojourn. Where is the genius to 

 bring a distracted entomologist the mirror and ring of Canace, so that 

 he may learn what secrets yet lie hid high up among the thick leaves 

 of the greenwood ? Where are the imprecations to hurl at the head of 

 that man of the future, that shall bring here his bricks and mortar to 

 desecrate the home of the Cicada 1 



Lest I should go crazy, and rage like another Orestes, I prudently 

 dismiss the Cicada from present thoughts, and join myself to a young 

 gentleman who is evidently on the track of game. Hallo, Palamides ! 

 The bramble flowers are now swept for Fritillaries, and the grassy 

 spots beat about for marbled whites. We cannot find a black Papkis,, 

 that forest gipsy. And the ground, too, proves decidedly damp. I 

 am now fairly over my boots, and the children of the morass are 

 holding carnival around. 



Now two stately dragon-flies {Cor duUg aster annulatui) rush rustling 

 past me, and the diamond-headed green water-snake {Tropidonotiis 

 mtrix) glides between my legs, and threatens to ascend my trousers. 



