Among the Orthoptera[76] we meet with some of the largest of insects,
and particularly those which are of strange and extraordinary shapes.
The best known insects of this order are the _Mantes_, Cockroaches,
Earwigs,[77] Locusts, Grasshoppers, Crickets, &c.
[76] From [Greek: orthos], straight, and [Greek: pteron], wing,
on account of the manner in which the under-wings are folded
under the upper.--ED.
[77] Made a separate Order, _Dermaptera_, by Kirby.--ED.
The Orthoptera have the anterior wings long, narrow, half-horny. These
are elytra, which serve as cases for their second wings, as is the
case with the Coleoptera. But the elytra of the Orthoptera are less
solid and less complete than those of the Coleoptera. Moreover, they
generally overlap each other when the insect is at rest, which is
another distinctive characteristic. The second wings are membranous,
very broad, and veined; and, when at rest, are folded up like a fan.
The mouth is composed of free pieces. The mandibles, the jaws, and the
two lips, always well developed, show them to be insects which grind
their food. Their voracity, and the rapid way in which they multiply,
sometimes make these insects the pest of the country. Above all, they
are to be met with in hot countries, where they cause such great
damage that all vegetation disappears on their passage. There are not
a great variety of species of Orthoptera. They are insects whose
metamorphoses are incomplete; that is, they undergo only trifling
changes from the moment when the eggs are hatched to the time when the
insect is fully developed.
When it leaves the egg, the young one resembles its parents; it
differs only in size and in having no wings. After moulting four or
five times it has almost reached its full growth, and its wings begin
to appear under a sort of membrane. This is the pupa state. A final
moulting sets free the wings also, and the insect, now perfect,
launches itself into the air with its congeners.
The Orthoptera are vegetable feeders, and frequently commit great
ravages on various crops. They are divided into two groups, viz.,
those which _run_, and those which _jump_ or _leap_. We will begin
with those which run, which contains the Earwig (_Forficula_), the
Cockroach (_Blatta_), the genus _Mantis_, or Leaf Insects, and the
genus _Phasma_.
The _Forficula_, or Earwig, is represented in Figs. 298, 299, 300, in
its three different states. The lower wings are very broad, and folded
at the same time like a fan, and doubled up. Its abdomen terminates in
a sort of pair of pincers, resembling those which the jewellers
formerly used for piercing the ears of young girls as a preparatory
step to their wearing ear-rings. Hence, without doubt, their French
name of _Perce-oreille_, or ear-piercer; for there is nothing to
justify the vulgar belief that these insects introduce themselves into
the ear, and bore a hole into its interior, through which they may
penetrate into the brain; in fact, they are very innocent insects, and
do little harm. They live on vegetable matter, and more especially the
interiors of certain flowers.
[Illustration: Figs. 298, 299, 300.--Common Earwig (_Forficula
auricularia_)--larva, pupa, and imago.]
The _Forficulæ_ avoid the light. They are to be found in the chinks of
trees, under bark, and under stones. The female watches over the eggs
with maternal solicitude, and carries them away elsewhere when they
are touched. She also protects the larvæ and pupæ till they are strong
enough to dispense with all attention.
The _Blattæ_, or Cockroaches, are very destructive insects, as the
name, derived from the Greek word [Greek: Blaptein], to damage,
implies. They are omnivorous, attacking all sorts of dead substances,
vegetable and animal. Horace reproaches them with devouring stuffs,
like the moths:--
"Cui stragula vestis,
Blattarum ac tinearum epulæ,
Putrescit in arca."
These disagreeable insects devour our eatables, abounding in kitchens,
in bakers' shops, on board merchant vessels, &c. Their flattened
bodies allow them easily to introduce themselves into the cracks of
cases or barrels; so that, to be safe against their attacks, it is
necessary, on long voyages, to shut up the goods in zinc-lined boxes,
or cases made of sheet-iron well soldered together.
Chamisso relates that the sailors having opened some barrels which
should have contained rice and wheat, found them filled with German
Cockroaches (_Blatta Germanica_). This transubstantiation was not very
agreeable to the crew! Other naturalists have seen this insect
invading by millions bottles which had contained oil. The Cockroach is
very fond also of the blacking on boots, and devours leather and all.
One pupa sometimes eats the skin cast off by another pupa, but a
Cockroach has never been known to attack another with a view to eating
him afterwards.
These Orthoptera have a flat broad body, the thorax very much
developed, the antennæ very long, and the legs thin but strong, which
enable them to run with remarkable quickness. They diffuse around them
a sickening odour, which often hangs about objects they have touched.
Aristophanes, the Greek comic poet, mentions this peculiarity in his
comedy of "The Peace." They come out mostly at night, and hide
themselves during the day. They are the most cosmopolitan of all
insects. Carried over in ships, they perpetuate everywhere, just like
weeds! Persian powder, composed of pulverised _pyrethra_, is an
excellent means to employ for their destruction.
Most of the species of cockroaches are black or brownish. Two among
them, the _Blatta Germanica_ and the _Blatta Laponica_, which are to
be met with in the woods round about Paris, have domesticated
themselves in dwellings of the northern countries. They are a quarter
of an inch in length. The Russians pretend that the former was
imported from Prussia by their army, on its return from Germany, after
the Seven Years' War (1756-1762). Till this period it was unknown at
St. Petersburg, where now-a-days it is met with in great numbers. It
lives in houses, and eats pretty nearly everything, but prefers white
bread to flour and meat. The _Blatta Laponica_ devours the smoked fish
prepared for the winter.
The German naturalist, Hummel, made some interesting observations on
the development and habits of the very prolific _Blatta Germanica_. It
lays its eggs in a silky capsule, which is in the form of a bean, with
two valves in the interior. This is drawn about for some time appended
to the extremity of the abdomen, and after a time abandoned.
Hummel placed under a bell-glass a female cockroach and a perfect
egg-pouch, which had only just been abandoned by another female. He
saw the cockroach approach the bag, feel it, and turn it about in all
directions. She then took it between her front legs, and made a
longitudinal opening in it. As the opening grew wider, little white
larvæ were seen to come from it rolled up and attached together. The
female presided at this operation. She assisted the larvæ to set
themselves free, aiding them out gently with her antennæ. In a few
seconds they were able to walk, when she ceased to trouble herself
about them.
The larvæ change their skin six times before reaching the perfect
state. When they come out of their skin they are colourless, but the
colour comes in a few minutes. At the fifth moult, which takes place
three months after birth, they become pupæ, with rudimentary wings,
the whole shape of the insect being well marked. The sixth, or last
moult, takes place at the end of six weeks. The pupa is now changed
into a perfect insect. The female is distinguished from the male by
the greater size of her abdomen.
[Illustration: Fig. 301.--The Cockroach (_Blatta orientalis_).]
The most destructive of the _Blattæ_, or Cockroaches, are those which
have been imported into Europe by the ships coming from the colonies.
The _Kakerlac Americana_ is from an inch to an inch and a quarter
long. It infests ships, running about at night over the sleeping
passengers, and devouring the food. They are to be met with in all
parts of the world. They abound particularly in the warm parts of
America. The _Blatta orientalis_ is more commonly met with than the
above. It swarms in kitchens, in bakers' shops, provision shops, &c.,
where it hides in the cracks of the walls, or against the hinges of
the doors. It is a small hideous animal, of a repulsive smell, and of
a reddish brown colour. It is a little larger than the _Blatta
Americana_. In France it is called by various names, such as _Cafard_,
_Panetière_, _Noirot_, _Bête noir_, &c. If in the middle of the night
you suddenly enter with a light into the down-stairs kitchens, you
will often see these little beasts running about on the table, and
devouring the remains of the food with astonishing rapidity.
The largest species of the genus of which we are now treating is the
_Kakerlac insignis_, which inhabits Cayenne and Brazil, and in length
sometimes exceeds an inch and three-quarters, and in the extent of its
wings four inches and a half.
It is principally in hot countries that the cockroaches do the
greatest damage. In the Antilles, of which they are the pest, it is
affirmed that in one single night they can bore holes through trunks,
through cases, and through bags, and destroy objects which were
supposed to be in perfect safety. Sometimes the walls, the floors, the
beds, the tables, everything, in short, is infested by them, and it is
impossible to find a way of preserving the food from their repulsive
touch. One can, however, partially succeed in destroying them by the
aid of insect powders. They have, however, natural enemies. Poultry
and owls are very fond of them. A species of wasp, _Chlorion
compressum_, lays up a stock of cockroaches, which it previously
renders insensible, for its larvæ. Many species of _Chalcidiæ_, a
family of Hymenoptera, also live on the eggs of these Orthoptera.
There are also among the cockroaches certain brightly-coloured exotic
species. These colours show that they do not avoid the light. We will
mention as examples the _Brachycola robusta_ and the species of
_Corydia_.
The _Mantidæ_ are pretty insects, of very different habits from the
preceding. They alone of the Orthoptera are carnivorous. They eat live
insects, seizing their prey as it passes by them. They rest generally
on shrubs, remaining for hours together perfectly motionless, the
better to deceive other insects which are to become their victims.
It is this fixed and as it were meditative attitude which has gained
for them the name of _Mantis_, derived from the Greek word [Greek:
mantis], or "diviner," as it was imagined that in this attitude they
interrogated the future. The manner in which they hold their long
front legs, raised like arms to Heaven, has also contributed to make
this superstitious notion believed, and sufficiently explains the
names given to divers species of _Mantidæ_; such as Nun, Saint,
Preacher, Suppliant, Mendicant, &c. Caillaud, a traveller, tells us
that in Central Africa a _Mantis_ is an object of worship. According
to Sparmann, another species is worshipped by the Hottentots. If by
chance a _Mantis_ should settle on a person, this person is considered
by them to have received a particular favour from heaven, and from
that moment takes rank among the saints!
In France the country people believe that these insects point out the
way to travellers. Mouffet, a naturalist of the seventeenth century,
says on this subject, in a description of the _Mantis_:--"This little
creature is considered of so divine a nature, that to a child who asks
it its way, it points it out by stretching out one of its legs, and
rarely or never makes a mistake."
In the eyes of the Languedoc peasants the _Mantis religiosa_ is almost
sacred. They call it _Prega-Diou_ (_Prie-Dieu_), and believe firmly
that it performs its devotions--its attitude, when it is on the watch
for its prey, resembling that of prayer. Settled on the ground, it
raises its head and thorax, clasps together the joints of its front
legs, and remains thus motionless for hours together. But only let an
imprudent fly come within reach of our devotee, and you will see it
stealthily approach it, like a cat who is watching a mouse, and with
so much precaution that you can scarcely see that it is moving. Then,
all of a sudden, as quick as lightning, it seizes its victim between
its legs, provided with sharp spines, which cross each other, conveys
it to its mouth, and devours it. Our make-believe Nun, Preacher, our
_Prega-Diou_, is nothing better than a patient watcher and pitiless
destroyer. The _Mantis religiosa_ (Fig. 302), common enough in the
south of France, comes as far north as the environs of Fontainebleau.
The _Mantis oratoria_, rather smaller, is less commonly met with.
These elegant insects are remarkable for their long slim bodies, their
large wings, and their colours, which are generally very bright. In
some species their green or yellowish elytra look so exactly like the
leaves of trees that one can hardly help taking them for such.
The _Mantis_ lays its eggs at the end of summer, in rounded, very
fragile shells, attached to the branches of trees; they do not hatch
till the following summer. The larvæ undergo several successive
moultings. Nothing equals the ferocity of these Orthoptera. If two of
them are shut up together, they engage in a desperate combat; they
deal each other blows with their front legs, and do not leave off
fencing until the stronger of the two has succeeded in eating off the
other's head. From their very birth, the larvæ attack each other. The
male being smaller than the female, is often its victim.
Kirby tells us that in China the children procure them as in France
they do cockchafers, and shut them up in bamboo cages, to enjoy the
exciting spectacle of their combats.
[Illustration: Fig. 302.--Mantis religiosa and its larva (A).
Blepharis mendica and its larva (B).]
_Acanthops_, a genus of this family, inhabits the Brazils.
Akin to the _Mantis_ are the _Eremiaphilæ_, which live in the deserts
of Africa and Arabia. They drag themselves gently along on the ground,
and as they are the same colour as the sand on which they are found,
it is very difficult to distinguish them when at rest. The traveller,
Lefebvre, relates that he always found these Orthoptera in places
destitute of all vegetation, and where there were no other sorts of
insects which could have served them for food; it is therefore
probable that they live on microscopic insects.
The _Empusa_, which forms another genus of _Mantidæ_, has the antennæ
indented like a comb in the males, thread-like in the females. The
_Empusa gongylodes_, which inhabits Africa, has cuffs to its arms and
flounces to its robe.
The genus _Blepharis_, to which belongs the _Blepharis mendica_, is
met with in Egypt, Arabia, and in the Canary Islands. This insect,
which is of a pale green, is not rare in the south of France. It is
represented with the _Mantis religiosa_ in Fig. 302.
The _Phasmata_, or Spectres, are distinguished from the _Mantidæ_ by
their very elongated bodies, straight and stiff as a stick, by their
having no prehensile legs, and by their food, which is exclusively
vegetable. Their eggs are laid uncovered, having no silky envelope. As
for the habits of these insects, they are little known, the greatest
number of the species being exotics, inhabiting chiefly South America,
Asia, Africa, and New Holland. It is in this tribe that we meet the
most extraordinary and the most monstrously shaped insects, as the
popular names they have received in different countries show: such as
Spectres, Phantoms, Devil's Horses, Soldiers of Cayenne, Walking
Leaves, Animated Sticks, &c.
Among the Phasmæ we also find the largest insects known, for they
attain a considerable length, _Phasma gigas_ nearly reaching a foot.
The most beautiful are those of New Holland and of Tasmania, such as
_Cyphocrana (Phasma) gigas_.
Some species are destitute of wings, and resemble so exactly dry
sticks that it is impossible to tell the difference. The best known is
the _Bacillus (Phasma) Rossia_ (Fig. 303), which is found in the south
of France. This inoffensive insect walks gently along the branches of
trees, and likes to repose in the sun, its long antennæ-like legs
stretched out in front. Others of the genus _Phyllium_ are provided
with wings, and have altogether the appearance of the leaves on which
they live; such are the Walking Leaves of the East Indies. According
to Cunningham, all these insects are of solitary and peaceable habits.
They are only to be met with alone or in pairs, drawing themselves
gently along on shrubs, on which they pass the hottest months of the
year. Some of them, when they are seized, emit a milky liquid of a
very strong and disagreeable odour.
[Illustration: Fig. 303.--Phasma Rossia--male, female, and larva.]
Those Orthoptera which we have already mentioned had all their six
legs adapted to running, and are called _Cursoria_. Those which jump,
to which we now come, have their hind-legs stronger and thicker, which
enables them to leap, and are on that account called _Saltatoria_.
This section comprises three families, which have for their principal
types the Crickets, Locusts, and Grasshoppers.
All these insects resemble each other in the disproportion which
exists between their hind-legs and the other pairs. Another
characteristic which is common to them consists in the song of the
males. This song, so well known, which seems to have for its object to
call the females, is nothing but a sort of stridulation or screeching,
produced by the rubbing together of the wing cases, or elytra. But the
mechanism by which this is produced varies a little in all the three
kinds. With the Crickets the whole surface of the wing cases is
covered with thick nervures, very prominent and very hard, which cause
the noise the insect produces in rubbing the elytra one against the
other. With the Locusts, there exists only at the base of the elytra a
transparent membrane called the mirror, which is furnished with
prominent nervures, and produces the screeching noise. And, lastly, in
the Crickets the thighs and elytra are provided with very hard ridges.
The thighs, being passed rapidly and with force over the nervures of
the elytra, produce the sound, in the same way as a fiddle-bow when
drawn across the strings of a violin. In all these insects the male
alone is endowed with the faculty of producing sound.
The Crickets and Grasshoppers have very long and thin antennæ, whilst
the Locusts have short antennæ, and either flattened or filiform, or
swelling out at one extremity like a club. The female of the first two
is provided with an ovipositor in the shape of an auger.
We will study successfully the three types of these families, that is
to say, the Crickets, the Locusts, and the Grasshoppers.
The Field Cricket (_Gryllus campestris_, Fig. 304) lives alone in a
hole which it digs in the ground, and in which it remains during the
day. It only quits its retreat at night, when it goes in search of
food. It is very timid, and at the least noise ceases its song. If it
is stationed on the side of its hole, it retreats into it the moment
any one approaches.
The holes of the crickets are well known to country children, who take
these insects by presenting a straw to them. The pugnacious cricket
seizes it directly with its mandibles, and lets itself be drawn out of
its hole. It is this which has given rise to the saying, "_plus sot
qu'un grillon_" (a greater fool than a cricket). It is very
susceptible of cold, and always makes the opening of its hole towards
the south. It lives on herbs, perhaps also on insects.
The House Cricket is about half an inch long, of an ashy colour, and
is to be met with principally in bakers' shops and country kitchens,
where it hides itself during the day in the crevices of the walls or
at the back of the fireplaces. It eats flour, and also, perhaps, the
little insects which live in flour.
If crickets are put into a box together, they devour each other. This
does not prove conclusively that they are carnivorous, for there are
many species, eating nothing but vegetables, which would destroy each
other in a similar case. Some authors say that these insects are
always thirsty, for they are often to be found drowned in the vessels
containing any kind of liquid. Everything damp is to their taste. It
is for this reason that they sometimes make holes in wet clothes,
which are hung up before the fire to dry. They inhabit, by preference,
houses newly built; for the mortar, being still damp, allows them to
hollow out their dwelling-places with greater ease.
[Illustration: Fig. 304.--Field Cricket (_Gryllus campestris_).]
The habits of the House Cricket (_Gryllus domesticus_) are nocturnal,
like those of its congener of the fields. It is only at night that it
leaves its retreat to seek its food. When it is exposed against its
will to the light of day, it appears to be in a state of torpor. This
insect reminds one of the owl, among birds, not only from its habit of
avoiding the light, but also from its monotonous song, which the
vulgar consider, one does not know why, a foreboding of ill-luck to
the house in which it is heard. Formerly this singular prejudice was
much deeper rooted than it is at present The song of the cricket has
merely the object of calling the female. The Wood Cricket (_Gryllus_
[_Nemobius_] _sylvestris_) is much smaller than the above, and is met
with in great numbers in the woods, where its leaps sometimes produce
the noise of drops of rain.
[Illustration: Fig. 305.--Mole Cricket (_Gryllo-talpa vulgaris_).]
The female crickets have a long egg-layer, or ovipositor, with which
they deposit their eggs, of which each one lays, towards the middle of
the summer, about three hundred, in the cracks and crevices of the
soil. The larvæ pass the winter in that state, and do not become pupæ
and perfect insects till the following summer.
Mouffet relates that, in certain regions of Africa, the crickets are
objects of commerce. They are brought up in little cages, as we do
Canary birds, and sold to the inhabitants, who like to hear their
amorous chant. It is said that some tribes eat these insects. In
France they are sought after as baits for fishing, and are used also
in menageries for feeding small reptiles. Next to _Gryllus_ come the
genera _OEcanthus_, insects of the south of Europe, which live on
plants, and which one often sees fluttering about flowers; _Sphæria_,
which live in ant-hills; _Platydactylus_; and, lastly, the Mole
Cricket (_Gryllo-talpa_), whose habits deserve attention for a while.
The Mole Crickets are distinguished from all other insects by the
structure of their fore-legs, which are wide and indented, in such a
manner as to resemble a hand, analogous to that of the mole. This leg
betrays the habits of the cricket much better than our hands betray
ours. They make use of them, indeed, as spades, with which they hollow
out subterranean galleries, and accumulate at the side of the
entrance-hole the rubbish thus drawn out. The French name comes from
the old French word _courtille_, which means garden. Such places and
vineyards are the favourite haunts of these destructive insects.
If the Mole Crickets, or _Courtilières_, have spades on their front
legs, their hind-legs are very little developed, so that it would be
perfectly impossible for them to jump, particularly as their large
abdomen would hinder their so doing. The wings are broad, and fold
back in the form of a fan; they make little use of them, and it is
only at night-fall that the mole cricket is seen to disport himself,
describing curves of no great height in the air. It is found
principally in cultivated land, kitchen-gardens, nursery gardens,
wheat fields, &c., where it scoops out for itself an oval cavity
communicating with the surface by a vertical hole (Fig. 306). On this
hole abut numerous horizontal galleries, more or less inclined, which
permit the insect to gain its retreat by a great many roads, when
pursued.
It is easy to understand that an insect which undermines land in this
way must cause great damage to cultivation. Whether the crops serve it
for food or not, they are not the less destroyed by its underground
burrowings. Lands infested by the mole cricket are recognisable by the
colour of the vegetation, which is yellow and withered; and the
rubbish which these miners heap up at the side of the openings leading
to their galleries, resembling mole-hills in miniature, betray their
presence to the farmer. To destroy them, they pour water or other
liquids into their nests, or else they bury, at different distances,
vessels filled with water, in which they drown themselves. From the
month of April the males betake themselves to the entrance of their
burrows, and make their cry of appeal. Their notes are slow,
vibrating, and monotonous, and repeated for a long time without
interruption, and somewhat resembling the cry of the owl or the
goat-sucker.
[Illustration: Fig. 306.--The nest of the Mole Cricket (_Gryllo-talpa
vulgaris_).]
The female lays her eggs, to the number of from two to three hundred,
in the interior of a sort of chamber scooped out in soil stiff enough
to resist the action of rain. The hatching takes place at the end of a
month.
It is not till the following spring that the larvæ pass into the pupa
state, and that the organs of flight begin to be marked out. According
to M. Féburier, three years are required for the complete development
of the mole cricket, which is a fact that indicates remarkable
longevity in these insects. All authors agree, moreover, in extolling
the solicitude with which the mole cricket takes care of her little
ones. She watches over them, and, they say, procures them food.
The genus _Tridactylus_, which bears a great analogy to the mole
cricket, is the smallest genus of Orthoptera known; the species are
not more than a sixth of an inch in length, and are found in the south
of France, on the banks of the Rhône and other rivers, where they
disport themselves in sand exposed to the sun. The _Tridactyli_ leap
with remarkable agility, even on the surface of the water, for their
legs are provided with flat appendages much resembling battledores.
The Grasshoppers and Locusts take much longer leaps than the Crickets,
owing to the conformation of their hind-legs, and they often make use
of their wings also, which are very fully developed. These insects are
unable to walk, on account of the disproportion which exists between
their different pairs of legs. The female is provided with a curved
ovipositor with two valves, which serves for breaking up the ground
for the reception of its eggs. The male produces a sharp stridulation
or screeching sound, by rubbing the cases of its wings--which are
furnished with plates which might be compared to cymbals--one against
another.
The song of the grasshopper, known by everyone, is a monotonous
"zic-zic-zic," which can be heard during the day in grassy places. It
is on account of this song that the name of Cigale is sometimes given,
though wrongly, to the great green grasshopper. As we have already
said in speaking of the Cigale, it is the green grasshopper which La
Fontaine had in view in his fable of _La Cigale et la Fourmi_, for all
the plates which ornament the ancient editions of the fables of this
author represent a grasshopper, and not a Cigale. Grasshoppers are
spread over the whole surface of the earth, but are to be met with
chiefly in South America, which contains nearly three-fourths of the
species known. The European species, on the contrary, are few.
Their habits resemble those of the other herbivorous Orthoptera. They
live in meadows, on trees, devouring the leaves and stalks of plants;
but they are never found in such great numbers as to cause damage at
all to be compared to that caused by the locust. They appear in the
month of July and disappear at the beginning of the cold weather.
Towards the end of summer their song is heard in the meadows and wheat
fields. The females, summoned by the males, are not long in coupling
and laying their eggs, which do not hatch until the following spring,
in the ground. After four months the larvæ change into pupæ, which
already show rudimentary wings, and which by a fifth month pass into
the perfect state.
The Great Green Grasshopper (_Locusta viridissima_) is very common in
Europe. It remains during the day on trees, and in the evening
disports itself in the fields.
[Illustration: Fig. 307.--Decticus verrucivorus.]
The _Decticus verrucivorus_ (Fig. 307) is a shorter and more thick-set
species, whose distinctive feature is a very broad head. Its colour is
grey of various shades, and it is to be heard singing during the day
in fields of ripe wheat. The name comes from the use made of it by the
peasants in Sweden and Germany as a cure for warts.
"The peasants," says Charles de Geer, "make these locusts bite the
warts which they often have on their hands, and the liquid which at
the same time flows from the insect's mouth into the wound causes the
warts to dry up and disappear. It is for this reason they have given
them the name of Wart-bit or Wart-biter."
The _Phaneropteræ_ and the _Copiphores_ are exotic Locusts. The
_Ephippigeræ_ are small species whose thorax, which is very convex,
resembles a saddle.
One often meets in the environs of Paris the Vine Ephippiger
(_Ephippigera vitium_), which is greenish, with four brown stripes on
its head. In this species the wing cases, or elytra, are almost
obsolete, and the wings are reduced to mere arched scales, whose
friction produces a stridulation or screeching noise. The females are
provided with a similar apparatus, so that they perform duets.[78]
[78] The species of genus _Saga_ sometimes reach extraordinary
dimensions. Thus, in 1863, there was found in Syria, after a
shower of ordinary locusts, a specimen of the _Saga_ which was
three inches and a quarter long. It was presented to the Museum
of Natural History of Paris, by M. L. Delair.
The genus _Gryllacris_ resembles the crickets. It contains the
_Anostostomæ_ of New Holland, which are said to be destitute of wings,
even in the perfect state.
We arrive now at the redoubtable tribe of _Acridium_, or Locust, whose
fearful ravages are so well known.
These are, among the Orthoptera, the best adapted for jumping. The
thigh and the leg, folded together when at rest, are stretched out
suddenly under the action of very powerful muscles. The body, resting
then on the tarsi and on the flexible spines of the legs, is shot into
the air to a great height. They fly very well, but the power of
walking and running is denied to them, as it is also to the other
_Saltatoriæ_. The females have no ovipositor. This peculiarity, and
the formation of their antennæ, which are very short, distinguish the
locusts from the grasshoppers.
The males, as we have already said, make a shrill stridulation by
rubbing their thighs over their elytra. There is never more than one
thigh in motion at a time; the insect using the right and the left by
turns. The sound is made stronger by a sort of drum filled with air,
and covered with a very thin skin, which is found on each side of the
body, at the base of the abdomen. The locust's song is less monotonous
than that of the grasshopper. It is capable of much variation; it is a
noise just like that of a rattle, but with sounds which vary very
much, according to the species.
They move about by day, frequent dry places, and are very fond of
sitting on the grass in the sun. Certain species, which inhabit the
warm regions of the south, move their legs with scarcely any noise; it
being only perceptible to a very fine ear.
Locusts are very abundant in many parts of the world. In northern
countries, where they multiply less rapidly, their ravages are less
disastrous, though still very considerable. But in the southern
portions of the globe they are a perfect pest--the eighth plague of
Egypt. Certain species multiply in such a prodigious manner, that they
lay waste vast spaces of land, and in a very short time reduce whole
countries to the very last state of misery. These insects inflate
themselves with air, and undertake journeys during which they travel
more than six leagues a day, laying waste all vegetation on their
road.
[Illustration: Fig. 308.--Locust (_Acridium_ [_OEdipoda_]
_migratorium_).]
The most destructive species is the Migratory Locust (_Acridium_ [or
_OEdipoda_] _migratorium_, Fig. 308), which is very common in
Africa, India, and throughout the whole of the East. Isolated
specimens of this insect are to be found in the meadows round about
Paris, especially towards the end of the summer, and, very rarely, in
England. This species is greenish, with transparent elytra of a dirty
grey, whitish wings, and pink legs. A second species, the Italian
locust, also does a great deal of damage in the south. All the species
undergo five moults, which take six weeks each. The last takes place
at the end of the hot weather, towards the autumn.
It is especially in warm climates that they become such fearful pests
to agriculture. Wherever they alight, they change the most fertile
country into an arid desert. They are seen coming in innumerable
bands, which, from afar, have the appearance of stormy clouds, even
hiding the sun. As far and as wide as the eye can reach the sky is
black, and the soil is inundated with them. The noise of these
millions of wings may be compared to the sound of a cataract. When
this fearful army alights upon the ground, the branches of the trees
break, and in a few hours, and over an extent of many leagues, all
vegetation has disappeared, the wheat is gnawed to its very roots, the
trees are stripped of their leaves. Everything has been destroyed,
gnawed down, and devoured. When nothing more is left, the terrible
host rises, as if in obedience to some given signal, and takes its
departure, leaving behind it despair and famine. It goes to look for
fresh food--seeking whom, or rather in this case, what it may devour!
(PLATE VIII.)
During the year succeeding that in which a country has been devastated
by showers of locusts, damage from these insects is the less to be
feared; for it happens often that after having ravaged everything,
they die of hunger before the laying season begins. But their death
becomes the cause of a greater evil. Their innumerable carcases, lying
in heaps and heated by the sun, are not long in entering into a state
of putrefaction; epidemic disease, caused by the poisonous gases
emanating from them, soon break out, and decimate the populations.
These locusts are bred in the deserts of Arabia and Tartary, and the
east winds carry them into Africa and Europe. Ships in the eastern
parts of the Mediterranean are sometimes covered with them at a great
distance from the land.
It is related in the Bible, in the tenth chapter of Exodus, that
Jehovah commanded Moses to stretch forth his hand to make locusts
(Arbeth) come over the whole land of Egypt as the eighth plague,
destined to intimidate Pharaoh, who had rebelled against Him. These
insects arrived, brought by an east wind, and covered the surface of
the country to such a degree that the air was darkened by them.[79]
[79] "And Moses stretched forth his rod over the land of Egypt,
and the Lord brought an east wind upon the land all that day,
and all that night; and when it was morning, the east wind
brought the locusts. And the locusts went up over all the land
of Egypt, and rested in all the coasts of Egypt: very grievous
were they; before them there were no such locusts as they,
neither after them shall be such. For they covered the face of
the whole earth, so that the land was darkened; and they did
eat every herb of the land, and all the fruit of the trees
which the hail had left; and there remained not any green thing
in the trees, or in the herbs of the field, through all the
land of Egypt."--EXOD. x. 13-15.
They ate up all the herbs of the field and all the fruit of the trees
which the hail (the seventh plague) had left. A west wind swept
them away again, when Pharaoh had at last promised to allow the
children of Israel to depart.
[Illustration: VIII. A Cloud of Locusts in Algeria.]
Pliny relates that in many places in Greece a law obliged the
inhabitants to wage war against the locusts three times a year; that
is to say, in their three states of egg, larva, and adult. In the Isle
of Lemnos the citizens had to pay as taxes so many measures of
locusts. In the year 170 before our era they devastated the environs
of Capua. In the year of our Lord 181 they committed great ravages in
the north of Italy and in Gaul. In 1690 locusts arrived in Poland and
Lithuania by three different ways, and, as it were, in three different
bodies. "They were to be found in certain places where they had died,"
writes the Abbé Ussaris, an eye-witness, "lying on one another in
heaps of four feet in height. Those which were alive, perched upon the
trees, bending their branches to the ground, so great was their
number. The people thought that they had Hebrew letters on their
wings. A rabbi professed to be able to read on them words which
signified God's wrath. The rains killed these insects: they infected
the air; and the cattle, which ate them in the grass, died
immediately."
In 1749 locusts stopped the army of Charles XII., King of Sweden, as
it was retreating from Bessarabia, on its defeat at Pultowa. The king
thought that he was assailed by a hail-storm, when a host of these
insects beat violently against his army as it was passing through a
defile, so that men and horses were blinded by this living hail,
falling from a cloud which hid the sun. The arrival of the locusts had
been announced by a whistling sound like that which precedes a
tempest; and the noise of their flight quite over-powered the noise
made by the Black Sea. All the country round about was soon laid waste
on their route. During the same year a great part of Europe was
invaded by these pests, the newspapers of the day being full of
accounts relating to this public calamity. In 1753 Portugal was
attacked by them. This was the year of the earthquake of Lisbon, and
all sorts of plagues seemed at this time to rage in that unfortunate
country.
In 1780, in Transylvania, their ravages assumed such gigantic
proportions that it was found necessary to call in the assistance of
the army. Regiments of soldiers gathered them together and enclosed
them in sacks. Fifteen hundred persons were employed in crushing,
burying, and burning them; but, in spite of all this, their number did
not seem to diminish; but a cold wind, which fortunately sprang up,
caused them to disappear. In the following spring the plague broke out
again, and every one turned out to fight against it. The locusts were
swept with great brooms into ditches, in which they were then burnt;
not, however, before they had ruined the whole country. Locusts showed
themselves at the same time in the empire of Morocco, where they
caused a fearful famine. The poor were to be seen wandering on all
sides, digging up the roots of vegetables, and eagerly devouring
camels' dung, in hopes of finding in it a few undigested grains of
barley.
Barrow and Levaillant, in their travels through Central Africa, speak
of similar calamities having happened many times between 1784 and
1797. They add that the surface of the rivers was then hidden by the
bodies of the locusts, which covered the whole country.
According to Jackson, in 1739 they covered the whole surface of the
ground from Tangiers to Mogador. All the region near to the Sahara was
ravaged, whilst on the other side of the river El Klos there was not
one of these insects. When the wind blew they were driven into the
sea, and their carcases occasioned a plague which laid Barbary waste.
India and China often suffer from these destructive insects. In 1735
clouds of locusts hid from the Chinese both the sun and moon. Not only
the standing crops, but also the corn in the barns and the clothes in
the houses were devoured.
In the south of France locusts multiply sometimes so prodigiously that
in a very short time many barrels may be filled with their eggs. They
have caused, at different periods, immense damage. It was chiefly in
the years 1613, 1805, 1820, 1822, 1824, 1825, 1832, and 1834, that
their visits to the south of France were most formidable.
Mézeray relates that in the month of January, 1613, in the reign of
Louis XIII., locusts invaded the country around Arles. In seven or
eight hours the wheat and crops were devoured to the roots over an
extent of country of 15,000 acres. They then crossed over the Rhine,
and visited Tarascon and Beaucaire, where they ate the vegetables and
lucerne. They then shifted their quarters to Aramon, to Monfrin, to
Valabregues, &c., where they were fortunately destroyed in great part
by the starlings and other insect-eating birds, which flocked in
innumerable numbers to this game.
The consuls of Arles and of Marseilles caused the eggs to be
collected. Arles spent, for this object, 25,000 francs, and Marseilles
20,000 francs. Three thousand quintals of eggs were interred or thrown
into the Rhône. If we count 1,750,000 eggs per quintal, that will give
us a total of 5,250,000,000 of locusts destroyed in the egg, which
otherwise would have very soon renewed the ravages of which the
country had so lately been the victim. In 1822 were spent again, in
Provence, 2,227 francs for the same object. In 1825 were spent 6,200
francs. A reward of 50 centimes was given for every kilogramme of
eggs, and half the sum for every kilogramme of insects. The eggs
collected were burnt, or else crushed under heavy rollers. The
gathering was entrusted to women and children. The operation consisted
in dragging along the ground great sheets, the corners of which were
held up. The locusts came and settled on these, and were caught by
rolling the sheet up.
In the territory of Saintes-Maries, situated not far from
Aigues-Mortes, on the Mediterranean coast, 1,518 wheat sacks were
filled with dead locusts, amounting in weight to 68,861 kilogrammes;
and at Aries 165 sacks, or 6,600 kilogrammes. The rewards given
amounted to 5,542 francs; but, notwithstanding all this, the following
year the locusts caused still greater damage.
Locusts are always to be found in Algeria, in the provinces of Oran,
Bona, Algiers, and Bougia, but they never commit those terrible
ravages which change cultivated countries into deserts. There are in
Algeria years of locusts as there are with us years of cockroaches, of
blight, of caterpillars, &c. These plagues are fortunately rare. The
most terrible took place in 1845 and in 1866. In the former year a
formidable invasion of locusts took place. It lasted five months, from
March to July, each day bringing new bands of these devastating
insects; and M. Henry Berthoud, then in Algeria, saw a column of them,
whose passage began before daylight, and had scarcely ended at four
o'clock in the afternoon. Dr. Guyon, doctor to the army, and
correspondent of the Institute, addressed to this learned body an
account of a few peculiarities of this invasion, of which he was a
witness. He speaks of a band which passed on the 16th of March over
the plain of Sebdon, going in the direction of the desert of Angard.
Their passage lasted three hours. The locusts, having found nothing to
devour in the desert, came back again, and next day made a descent
upon the plain of Sebdon, which is 30 kilomètres long, by 12 to 15
kilomètres broad. In four hours all the crops were devoured, and all
vegetation destroyed. "The locusts," says the Doctor, "left behind
them an infectious odour of putrid herbs, produced by their
excretions."
At Algiers, in the Faubourg Bab-Azoum, they penetrated in masses into
the barley stores, and there was the greatest difficulty in driving
them away, great barricades being raised before the storerooms to stop
the invasion. In 1845 they penetrated into the pits in which the
natives preserve their wheat. According to the report of the
Commandant de la Place of Philippeville, M. Levaillant, a column of
locusts alighted in the country round about that town on the 18th of
March, 1845, which extended from 30 to 40 centimètres, and the locusts
were found heaped upon the ground to the height of three décimètres.
In the environs of Algiers alone were destroyed, in 1845, 369 quintals
of locusts. It is computed that 400 locusts go to a kilogramme. This
gives, then, a total of 14,760,000 insects destroyed. As in this
number half were probably females, and as each female lays on an
average seventy eggs, the result we arrive at is, that this stopped
the production of 516,600,000 larvæ on the territory of Algiers alone.
The invasion of locusts which took place in 1866 was as disastrous as
that of 1845. It was in the month of April, 1866, that the vanguard of
these destructive insects appeared. Debouching through the mountain
gorges and through the valleys, into the fertile plains near the
coast, they alighted first on the plain of Mitidja and on the Sahel
of Algiers. Their mass, at certain points, intercepted the light of
the sun, and resembled those whirlwinds of snow which, during the
storms of winter, hide the nearest objects from our view. Very
soon the cabbages, the oats, the barley, the late wheat, and the
market-gardeners' plants, were partly destroyed. In some places the
locusts penetrated into the interiors of the houses. By order of the
government of Algiers the troops joined the colonists in combating the
plague; and the Arabs, when they found that their interests were
suffering, rose to lend their aid against the common enemy. Immense
quantities of locusts were destroyed in a few days; but what could
human efforts do against these winged multitudes, who escape into
space, and only abandon one field to alight in the next?
It was impossible to prevent the fecundation of these insects. The
eggs quickly producing innumerable larvæ, the first swarms were very
soon not only replaced, but multiplied a hundredfold by a new
generation. The young locusts are particularly formidable on account
of their voracity. These hungry masses threw themselves upon
everything which was left by those which went before them. They choked
up the springs, the canals, and the brooks; and it was not without a
great deal of trouble that the waters were cleared of these causes of
infection. Almost at the same time the provinces of Oran and of
Constantine were invaded. At Tlemcen, where within the memory of man
locusts had never appeared, the ground was covered with them. At
Sidi-bel-Abbes, at Sidi-Brahim, at Mostaganem, they attacked the
tobacco, the vines, the fig-tree, and even the olive-trees, in spite
of the bitterness of their foliage. At Relizane and at L'Habra they
attacked the cotton-fields. The road, 80 kilomètres long, which
connects Mostaganem with Mascara, was covered to the whole of its
extent.
In the province of Constantine the locust appeared almost
simultaneously, from the Sahara to the sea, and from Bougia to La
Calle. At Batna, at Setif, at Constantine, at Guelma, at Bona, at
Philippeville, at Djidjelly, the inhabitants struggled with energy
against this invasion, but neither fire nor any obstacles opposed to
the advance of this winged army were able to stop their ravages. The
French Government, to alleviate as much as possible the ruin which was
thus brought upon the colony, opened a public subscription at the end
of the year 1866.
The negroes of Soudan endeavour to frighten the locusts in their
flight by savage yells. In Hungary they employed for the same object
the noise of cannon. In the middle ages, for the want of cannon, they
exorcised the locusts. A traveller of the sixteenth century, the monk
Alvarez, relates that he also employed exorcisms against an immense
host of these destructive insects which he met with in Ethiopia. When
he perceived them, he made the Portuguese and the natives form in
procession, and ordered them to chant psalms. "Thus chanting," says
he, "we went into a country where the corn was, which having reached,
I made them catch a good many of these locusts, to whom I delivered an
adjuration, which I carried with me in writing, by me composed the
preceding night, summoning, admonishing, and excommunicating them.
Then I charged them in three hours' time to depart to the sea, or else
to go to the land of the Moors, leaving the land of the Christians; on
their refusal of which, I adjured and convoked all the birds of the
air, animals, and tempests, to dissipate, destroy, and devour them;
and for this admonition I had a certain quantity of these locusts
seized, and pronouncing these words in their presence, that they might
not be ignorant of them, I let them go, so that they might tell the
rest." If one reflects that on their arrival in the land of the Moors,
these same locusts were perhaps received by prayers which had for
their object to send them back to the land of the Christians, they
must have been very much embarrassed by such contradictory
adjurations.
The Arabs have also an infallible means of ridding themselves of the
locusts. Here is what General Daumas tells us on the subject According
to Ben-Omar, the Prophet read one day, on the wings of a locust,
written in Hebrew characters: "We are the troops of the Most High God;
we each one lay ninety-nine eggs. If we were to lay a hundred we
should devastate the whole world." Upon which Mahomet, greatly
alarmed, made an ardent prayer, in which he begged God to destroy
these enemies of Mussulmans. In answer to this invocation, the angel
Gabriel told Mahomet that a part of his prayer should be granted.
Since that epoch, indeed, words of invocation to the Prophet, written
on a piece of paper, and enclosed in a reed, which is planted in the
middle of a wheat-field or orchard, have the power of turning away the
locusts.[80] This receipt is infallible, at least so say the devout
Mussulmans.
[80] "Le Grand Désert," par le Général E. Daumas et E. de
Chaucel. In 18mo. Paris, 1860.
There exists another quite as efficacious. They take four locusts, and
write on the wings of each a verse of the Koran (four verses of the
Koran are appropriated to this purpose). They then let the locusts
thus marked fly into the midst of the swarm, and the flying army
immediately take another direction.
By what the Arabs say, the locusts possess a number of virtues. When
you see them in a dream, they announce the future; if you dream that
you are eating them, it is a good omen; if you dream that it rains
golden locusts, God will restore to you that which you have lost; &c.
When Omar-ben-el-Khottal was Caliph, the locusts seemed to have
completely disappeared. There was great sadness in the country in
consequence. The Caliph especially was very much afflicted at it. He
sent carriers into Yemen, into Cham, and into Irak, to see if they
could not find a few. One of the _envoyés_ succeeded in his mission,
and brought back a handful of locusts. "God is great!" cried Omar, who
from that day had no more misgivings. In order to understand first the
despair and then the satisfaction of the Caliph Omar, it is written,
so say the Mussulmans, that the human race will disappear from the
earth after the extinction of the locusts; that these insects were
formed of the rest of the clay out of which man had been formed, and
that they were destined to serve him as food.
And so locusts and fish are the only creatures which God allows the
Mussulman to eat without being skinned. They must, however, have been
killed by one of the faithful, for otherwise their flesh is impure!
The Arabs eat, and are very fond of locusts. When he was asked his
opinion on this article of food, the Caliph Omar-ben-el-Khottal said,
"I only wish I had a basketful of them, wouldn't I scrunch them!"
According to General Daumas, locusts, fresh or preserved, are good
food for both men and camels. They are eaten grilled or boiled, or
prepared in the kous-koussou, after their legs, wings, and heads have
been taken off. Sometimes they are dried in the sun, and reduced to
powder, which is mixed with milk, and made into cakes with flour,
dripping, or butter and salt. Camels are very fond of them; and they
are given to them after having been dried, or roasted between two
layers of ashes. Dried and salted, they are in Asia and in Africa an
object of commerce. At Bagdad they sometimes cause the price of meat
to fall. The taste of their flesh may be compared to that of the crab.
Eastern nations have eaten locusts from time immemorial. The Greek
comic poet, Aristophanes, tells us, in the "Acharnians," that the
Greeks sold them in the markets. Moses allowed to the Jews four
species, which are mentioned in Leviticus. St. John the Baptist,
following the example of the prophet Amos, made them his food in the
desert, where he found nothing but locusts and a little honey. The
wholesomeness of this food was, however, disputed among the ancients.
Strabo relates that there existed on the borders of the gulf of Arabia
a people called by him _Acridophagi_, or Locust-eating people; but
they all came to a miserable end. These people procured for themselves
locusts by lighting great fires, when the equinoctial winds brought
these hosts. Blinded and suffocated by the smoke, the locusts fell to
the ground, and were picked up greedily by them, and eaten, fresh or
salted. "These locust-eaters," says Strabo, "are, it is true, active,
good runners; but their life never exceeds forty years. As they
approach this age, a horrible vermin issues from their bodies, which
eats them up, beginning from the belly, and so they die a miserable
death." The same tale is to be met with in a description of Admiral
Drake's voyage round the world. This traveller speaks of the natives
of Ethiopia, who live on locusts, as dying eaten up by winged insects
bred in their own bodies.
It is difficult to explain the origin of such fables. Travellers who
have visited Arabia agree in declaring that the locust is a most
wholesome article of food; that it is even fattening. At any rate, it
is good food for cattle and poultry. The ancients employed locusts in
medicine. Dioscorides asserts that the thighs of the locust, reduced
to powder, and mixed with the blood of the he-goat, is a cure for
leprosy; and mixed with wine, is a specific against the bite of the
scorpion, &c.
It remains for us to describe some other species of grasshoppers less
destructive in their ravages than the _Acridium migratorium_.
In the deserts of Egypt is to be met with the great _Eremobia_, and
in South America the _Ommexeca_, which walks rather than springs. On
the other hand, the _Tetrix_ springs very well. A remarkable feature
about them is their thorax, which is prolonged into a point, and
covers the whole body. They are small insects of gay and brilliant
colours, and generally remain on the leaves of low plants, and escape
easily from the hand that tries to catch them. The _Tetrix subulata_,
of a brownish colour, is common during spring, in the environs of
Paris, in the woods, and in dry and arid fields. The _Pneumoræ_ are
very strange insects. The males have a very prominent abdomen, which
resembles a bladder filled with air; and their wings are very much
developed. The females have the abdomen of the ordinary shape; their
wings are very short, or even quite rudimentary. The former produce a
sharp stridulation, by rubbing their hind-legs against a row of small
tubercles, which are to be seen on each side of the abdomen. The sound
is rendered still more penetrating by the vesiculous or bladder-like
abdomen, the skin of which is stretched as tight as a drum. The
_Pneumoræ_ inhabit the South of Africa, as also do the _Truxales_, a
few varieties of which, however, are to be met with in Spain, Sicily,
and the South of France.
We will pass in silence over a great number of other less interesting
species of Orthoptera. Those which we have described suffice to
justify us in what we said above, namely, that this order contains
insects of the strangest and most anomalous forms.