32 
pliny's natural history. 
[Book XI. 
even, wealthy and affluent as they are. They prefer the 
male before it has had sexual intercourse, and the female 
after ; and they take^ their eggs, which are white. They en- 
gender with the belly upwards. Upon the back they have 
a sharp-edged instrument,^ by means of which they excavate 
a hole to breed in, in the ground. The young is, at first, 
a small maggot in appearance, after which the larva assumes 
the form in which it is known as the tettigometra? It bursts 
its shell about the time of the summer solstice, and then takes, 
to flight, which always happens in the night. The insect, 
at first, is black and hard. 
This is the only living creature that has no mouth ; though 
it has something instead which bears a strong resemblance to 
the tongues of those insects which carry a sting in the mouth : 
this organ is situate in the breast* of the animal, and is em- 
ployed by it in sucking up the dew. The corselet itself forms a 
kind of pipe ; and it is by means of this that the achetse utter 
their note, as already mentioned. Beyond this, they have 
no viscera in the abdomen. When surprised, they spring 
upwards, and eject a kind of liquid, which, indeed, is our 
only proof that they live upon dew. This, also, is the only 
animal that has no outlet for the evacuations of the body. 
Their powers of sight are so bad, that if a person contracts 
his finger, and then suddenly extends it close to them, they 
will come upon it just as though it were a leaf. Some authors 
divide these animals into two kinds, the " surcularia,^'^ which 
is the largest, and the frumentaria,"^ by many known as the 
avenaria;''^ this last makes its appearance just as the corn is 
turning dry in the ear. 
(27.) The grasshopper is not a native of countries that are bare 
of trees — hence it is that there are none in the vicinity of the 
city of Cyrene — nor, in fact, is it produced in champaign coun- 
1 " Correptis " seems a preferable reading to conrupti," that adoDted 
by Sillig. 
2 The female has this, and employs it for piercing-, dead branches in which 
to deposit its eggs. 
3 The " mother of the grasshopper." 
* The trunk of the grasshopper, Cuvier says, is situate so low down, that 
it seems to be attached to the breast. With it the insect extracts the juices 
of leaves and stalks. 
^ Or twig-grasshopper." ^ Or corn-grasshopper.*' 
' Or " oat-grasshopper." 
