NOTES FROM NORTHERN TASMANIA. 235 
trees upon the soft night air, all other birds being then silent. 
It is said that the English cuckoo (C. canons) has at times the 
same weird habit. 
October 31. — In the sides of a large ditch which runs through 
a portion of the plains, I have noticed many holes, from half an 
inch to almost an inch and a half in diameter. Having found 
one right on the top of the bank, I dug into it with a jack-knife, 
and eventually turned out a very large black spider, of the family 
Mygalidce. These fierce creatures have the habit of burrowing 
into the moist ground and lining their tunnel with silk, stretching 
an awning of the same material a little above the entrance, but 
forming no trap-door. They then lie in wait at the bottom of 
the burrow for any insects which crawl or tumble into its murky 
recesses. 
November 2. — A large and pretty “ looper ” caterpillar {Gco- 
metridcs) was discovered stretched upon a twig of the swamp 
tea tree [Melaleuca). The back was adorned with three yellow 
stripes, between which were wavy black lines ; a row of red and 
yellow spots adorned each side ; the true legs were red, and the 
head white and black. This caterpillar was stretched quite 
stiffly from one twig to another of the bush, and could not be 
distinguished from the twigs except by a very close inspection. 
November 3. — The cicadas or “ locusts ” as they are commonly 
called here, were heard to-day for the first time this season. 
Their singing resembles the winding up of a large watch, and 
when dozens of them are going all at once in the hot sunshine, 
the noise they make is no inconsiderable feature of a summer 
day in the bush. The commonest are black, with fine trans- 
parent wings, and three red ocelli arranged in a triangle on the 
front of the head between the large compound eyes. The males 
only have the sounding apparatus, which arrangement causes 
one of the classical poets to observe, “ Happy cicadas ! Thy 
females are deprived of voice ! ” The latter, while being sung 
to, are generally engaged in boring wdth their augers into the 
bark of trees, the eggs being laid in the grooves thus produced. 
I have frequently observed them sitting upon the branches of my 
apple-trees, and have afterwards found the bark notched and 
scored by their borers. These cicadas are said to be the cause 
of the sweet white lumps of “manna” which are sometimes 
found under the eucalypts and other trees, and which exude from 
the wounds made by their suckers while imbibing the sap of the 
twigs. I have found small pieces of “ manna” upon the stem of 
one of the tea trees [Leptospermum scoparium), exuding from 
wounds through the bark, and in appearance and taste there did 
not seem to be any difference between that and the eucalypt 
product. 
The larger cicada is not so often seen, and appears to be 
nocturnal in its habits, one of them having come thumping 
against my window quite late at night, attracted by the light 
inside. I have never heard this species sing at all, nor in the 
