8 The South Australian N aturalisi. 
SUMMER AND THE CICADA. 
(By T. W. Nettelbeck.) 
Who of us, in our rambliiigs through the hills on hot 
summer days, has not heard the monotonous music of the 
Cicada, and looked up into the lofty branches searching for the 
noisy musician of the towering eucalypt? I am sure the Nature- 
lover would feel that something was missing among the trees 
if he or she had not heard that busy songster during an 
exploration in the hills on a summer day. One may frequently 
hear a person remark, “Oh! listen to the locusts!” But our 
little friend, in truth, has little in common with a locust, as he 
is not a gnawing or biting insect in the adult stage, but, on the 
contrary, a sucking insect, and so busy is he getting his nectar 
from the tree that he does not stop to sing between drinks. 
Dame Nature has provided a special musical apparatus beneath 
the abdomen of the male only, which is operated by a separate 
set of muscles, and produces that continuous drone with which 
we are all so familiar. The female, though dumb, is not less 
busy; she has been provided with a chisel-like instrument, 
which is fixed in the top of the abdomen. With this she can 
penetrate the soft surface of the bark, and, when the incision 
is made, the eggs are laid in in little batches. Soon the small 
white grub emerges from the egg, and makes its way to the 
ground, where it lives on roots until it changes to the pupal 
stage. It is provided with strong burrowing claws and a good 
horny covering to fit it for its work underground, where it 
lives till spring. It usually emerges from the ground during 
the early hours of the morning, while the surface of the earth 
is soft from the dew. Crawling up the nearest twig or tree 
trunk, it dries itself, and the outer covering splits down the 
centre of the back, and through this crack the insect crawls 
slowly and unsteadily until it is quite out. 
Its wings have yet to spread out and dry, as they are still 
wet and have a very pretty appearance like a little bundle of 
tinted gossamer ; but in a couple of hours they are completely 
grown and beautifully veined strong wings, and away flies the 
happy cicada to join its fellows in the trees. I can never 
forget an incident which occurred while I was collecting in the 
scrub in New South Wales. I came across an old, care-free 
swagman who, after learning that I was an insect hunter, 
looked at me as though I was a kind of harmless lunatic ; the 
cicadas were singing overhead, and he asked me about them. 
After my simple explanation of their ways, etc., he said; *‘No 
