affecting the Peas and Beans. 
433 
well backward and forward, for which purpose it is provided with 
two filaments like antennae at the apex of the abdomen, and 
when these insects desire to change their abode, they leave it in 
the evening, and either crawl or fly to another locality ; they have 
the power of leaping also. In these nocturnal peregrinations 
they are supposed to be luminous, and it has been suggested that 
the mole-cricket is the notorious "will-o'-the-wisp," the ignis 
fatuus of bygone days. 
This insect belongs to the Order Orthoptera, the Family 
AcHETiDJE, and the Genus Gryllotalpa, and Latreille has 
named the species 
14. G. vulgaris. It is 2 inches long, without the tails, which are 
half an inch more, and the wings expand 2^ inches.* It is velvety and 
of a rich brown colour, but more ochreous beneath : the head is conical, 
and can be drawn into the thorax at pleasure ; it is furnished with 2 
prominent eyes, between which are placed 2 little eyes called ocelli : the 
2 horns are twice as long as the head, inserted in cavities before the 
eyes, slender and tapering like bristles, but composed of from 60 to 100 
minute joints, the basal one the stoutest and oval : the mouth is large, 
comprising a large, somewhat orbicular, upper lip ; 2 strong, horny, 
elongated mandibles, curved and acute, with 2 or 3 teeth on the inside; 
2 elongated jaws, forming an acute horny lobe, with a smaller sharp one 
inside, and a long palpiform one outside ; the feelers or palpi are long 
and porrected, composed of o joints, the 2 basal ones small, 3rd the 
stoutest, 4th and 5th as long, the latter clavate with a globose fleshy 
gland at the apex; an under lip, which is elongated and terminated by a 
heart-shaped fleshy lobe, from the base of which arise 2 stiff parallel 
lobes, and on each side a stout, rigid, and pilose one, all of the same 
length; the 2 feelers are stout, rigid, and 3-jointed, the basal joint sub- 
globose ; 2nd and 3rd long, the latter the stoutest, the apex oval and 
fleshy. Thorax twice as broad as the head, convex, oval, the anterior 
margin concave : wing-cases short, somewhat oval, like parchment, 
yellowish-white externally, brown internally, partially covering one 
another in repose, with numerous strong longitudinal oblique and trans- 
verse nervures, forming cells which are more irregular at the base in 
the male than in the female, and this is almost the only external sexual 
difi'erence, for the female has no ovipositor. Wings 2, ample, mem- 
branous, triangular, folded longitudinally, lying upon the back when at 
rest, and extending beyond the abdomen ; they are dirty white, with an 
iridescent lustre, rayed like a fan with ochreous nervures and numerous 
transverse white ones ; the costa is brown, as well as a stripe below it : 
the abdomen is twice as long as the thorax, very thick, soft, and cylin- 
drical, composed of 9 or 10 rings ; on each side of the apex is a hairy 
filament like a rat's tail, as long as the antennae, but stouter. Legs 6, 
very strong, especially the anterior, which are compressed and dilated ; 
the hinder pair are formed for leaping : anterior thighs short and broad, 
* Cuitis"s Brit. Ent., fol. and pi. 456, where a coloured figure of the 
female is given, with various dissections of the mouth and other parts. 
