304 



NOISES OF INSECTS. 



by their motion. I must, therefore, leave them, as well as 

 the Trichoptera and Neuroptera, which are equally barren of 

 insects of sounding wing, and proceed to an order, the Hy- 

 menoptera, in which the insects that compose it are, many of 

 them, of more fame for this property. 



The indefatigable hive-bee, as she flies from flower to 

 flower, amuses the observer with her hum, which, though 

 monotonous, pleases by exciting the idea of happy industry, 

 that wiles the toils of labour with a song. When she alights 

 upon a flower, and is engaged in collecting its sweets, her 

 hum ceases; but it is resumed again the moment that she 

 leaves it. The wasp and hornet also are strenuous hummers ; 

 and when they enter our apartments, their hum often brings 

 terror with it. But the most sonorous flies of this order are 

 the larger humble-bees, whose bombination, booming, or 

 bombing, may be heard from a considerable distance, gra- 

 dually increasing as the animal approaches you, and when, in 

 its wheeling flight, it rudely passes close to your ear, almost 

 stunning you by its sharp, shrill, and deafening sound. 

 Many genera, however, of this order fly silently. 



But the noisiest wings belong to insects of the dipterous 

 order, a majority of which, probably, give notice of their 

 approach by the sound of their trumpets. Most of those, 

 however, that have a slender body, — the gnat genus ( Culex) 

 excepted, — explore the air in silence. Of this description 

 are the Tipularice, the Asilidce, the genus Empis, and their 

 affinities. The rest are more or less insects of a humming 

 flight ; and with respect to many of them, their hum is a 

 sound of terror and dismay to those who hear it. To man, 

 the trumpet of the gnat or mosquito, and to beasts, that of 

 the gad-fly, of various kinds of horse-flies, and of the Ethi- 

 opian zimb, as I have before related at large, is the signal of 

 intolerable annoyance. Homer, in his Batrachomyomachia, 

 long ago celebrated the first of these as a trumpeter : — 



" For their sonorous trumpets far renown'd, 

 Of battle the dire charge mosquito's sound." 



Mr. Pope, in his translation, with his usual inaccuracy, 

 thinking, no doubt, to improve upon his author, has turned 



