The Insect Folk

by Margaret Warner Morley

This horny substance is what makes the body of the insect so stiff. It would be soft but for the chitin, as the horny substance is called.

It is better for the insect to have a chitinous covering.

If you had no bones, you would be glad to have your skin hardened with chitin.

You see how it is, you wear your skeleton inside. Your skeleton is of bones; it is an inside skeleton.

The grasshoppers and all the insects wear their skeleton outside. It is made of chitin; it is an outside skeleton.

Insects have no bones.

They do not need any. They are kept stiff by the chitin.

Each ring in the insect's abdomen is made of four pieces, the back piece, the side pieces, and the under piece. You can see the back piece and one side piece in the picture, but you cannot see the other side piece nor the under piece without turning the insect over.

The rings are made in pieces so the insect can move.

Suppose each ring were made of one stiff piece like a finger ring. What a poor stiff, old grasshopper it would be! The rings are called segments.