The Life of the Grasshopper

Fame is built up mainly of legend; in the animal world, as in the world of men, the story takes precedence of history. Insects in particular, whether they attract our attention...

To come back to the Cicada after Réaumur [9] has told the insect’s story would be waste of time, save that the disciple enjoys an advantage unknown to the master. The great natu...

The exit-gate is passed and left wide open, like a hole made with a large gimlet. For some time the larva wanders about the neighbourhood, looking for some aerial support, a tin...

By his own confession, Réaumur never heard the Cicada sing; he never saw the insect alive. It reached him from the country round Avignon preserved in spirits and a goodly supply...

The Common Cicada entrusts her eggs to small dry branches. All those which Réaumur examined and found to be thus tenanted were derived from the mulberry-tree: a proof that the p...

Another creature of the south, at least as interesting as the Cicada, but much less famous, because it makes no noise. Had Heaven granted it a pair of cymbals, the one thing nee...

The little that we have seen of the Mantis’ habits hardly tallies with what we might have expected from her popular name. To judge by the term Prègo-Diéu, we should look to see...

Let us show the insect of the tragic amours under a more attractive aspect. Its nest is a marvel. In scientific language it is called ootheca, the egg-case. I shall not overwork...

The eggs of the Praying Mantis usually hatch in bright sunshine, at about ten o’clock on a mid-June morning. The median band or exit-zone is the only portion of the nest that af...

The sea, life’s first foster-mother, still preserves in her depths many of those singular and incongruous shapes which were the earliest attempts of the animal kingdom; the land...

The White-faced Decticus (D. albifrons, Fabr.) stands at the head of the Grasshopper clan in my district, both as a singer and as an insect of imposing presence. He has a grey c...

The White-faced Decticus is an African insect that in France hardly ventures beyond the borders of Provence and Languedoc. She wants the sun that ripens the olives. Can it be th...

Art has three fields which it may cultivate in the realm of natural objects: form, colour and sound. The sculptor uses form and imitates its perfection in so far as the chisel i...

We are in the middle of July. The astronomical dog-days are just beginning; but in reality the torrid season has anticipated the calendar and for some weeks past the heat has be...

Almost as famous as the Cicada, the Field Cricket, the denizen of the greenswards, figures among the limited but glorious number of the classic insects. He owes this honour to h...

Like all things of real value, it is very simple; it is based on the same principle as that of the Grasshoppers: a bow with a hook to it and a vibrating membrane. The right wing...

This announcement throws the household into great excitement at bed-time. What do my little helpmates see in their dreams? Blue wings, red wings, suddenly flung out fanwise; lon...

What can our Locusts do? Not much in the way of manufactures. Their business in the world is that of alchemists who in their gourdlike stomach elaborate and refine material dest...

I have just beheld a stirring sight: the last moult of a Locust, the extraction of the adult from his larval wrapper. It is magnificent. The object of my enthusiasm is the Grey...

In April, when the Swallow and the Cuckoo visit us, let us consider the fields for a while, keeping our eyes on the ground, as befits the eager observer of insect-life. We shall...