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.
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.