Page:Jardine Naturalist's library Entomology.djvu/251

Rh also, Mr. Westwood informs us, in several other allied undescribed species in his collection. The genus, in fact, seems to contain several groups, quite as distinct as the section formed by Latreille, (Gen. Crust. &c. III. 99,) for the reception of Acheta Italica, and of which Serville has composed the genus Œcanthus. A. Arachnoides may be regarded as forming a connecting link between Acheta and Phalangopsis of the last named author. Typical examples of this family are to be found in the well known domestic cricket, field cricket, and mole cricket. The two former are referred to the genus, which, besides them, comprehends two other British species. The history of the domestic cricket has been so often given, that it is unnecessary to repeat the particulars in this place. It occurs in most of the other countries of Europe, as well as in Britain. Its song, if such it may be called, (for which it is so highly valued in Spain, that the peasantry sometimes hang it in little cages by the fireside,) is produced by a very simple piece of mechanism, and is peculiar to the male. It consists of a kind of rounded areolet, tense and shining, situate at the base of each of the tegmina; the latter overlap each other, the right being uppermost, and the left beneath it. The nervures of their dorsal portion are thicker, and form larger cells in the male than in the female. When the former wishes to produce the sound, he elevates the hinder part of the tegmina in such a manner as to form an acute angle