Page:Insects - Their Ways and Means of Living.djvu/270



trees, underbrush, and weeds can hOt but make their downward journey one of many a bump and slide from leaf to leaf before the earth receives them. The creatures are too small tobe followed with the eye as they drop, and so their actual course and their be- havior when the ground is reached are hOt recorded. But several hatched indoors were placed on loose earth packed

Fro. t .6. The young cicada nymph ready to enter the ground (greatly enlarged) fiat in a small dish. These at once proceeded to get be- low the surface. "l'h«v did not dig in, but simply entered the first crevice that they met in running about. If the first happened to terminate abruptly, the nymph came out again and tried another. In a few minutes all had round satisfactory retreats and remained below. The eagerness with wlich the insects dived into any opening that presents itself indicates that the call to enter the earth is instinctive and imperative ouce their feet have touched the ground. Note, then, how within a few minutes their instincts shift to opposites: on hatching, their first eff,rt is to extricate themselves front the narrow confines of the egg nest, and it seems unlikely that enough light can penetrate the depths of this chamber to guide them to the exit; but once out and divested of their en- cumbering embrvonic clothes, the insects are irresistibly drawu in the diréction of the strongest light, even though this takes them upward--.ust the opposite of their [ 2-241

THE