Chapter I: Front Matter

THE WORKS OF J. H. FABRE

THE LIFE OF THE
GRASSHOPPER

BY
J. HENRI FABRE

Translated by
ALEXANDER TEIXEIRA DE MATTOS, F.Z.S.

HODDER AND STOUGHTON LIMITED
LONDON

CONTENTS

PAGE

TRANSLATOR’S NOTE vii

CHAPTER
I THE FABLE OF THE CICADA AND THE ANT 1
II THE CICADA: LEAVING THE BURROW 25
III THE CICADA: THE TRANSFORMATION 42
IV THE CICADA: HIS MUSIC 58
V THE CICADA: THE LAYING AND THE HATCHING OF THE EGGS 82
VI THE MANTIS: HER HUNTING 113
VII THE MANTIS: HER LOVE-MAKING 137
VIII THE MANTIS: HER NEST 147
IX THE MANTIS: HER HATCHING 170
X THE EMPUSA 191
XI THE WHITE-FACED DECTICUS: HIS HABITS 211
XII THE WHITE-FACED DECTICUS: THE LAYING AND THE
HATCHING OF THE EGGS 231
XIII THE WHITE-FACED DECTICUS: THE INSTRUMENT OF SOUND 246
XIV THE GREEN GRASSHOPPER 275
XV THE CRICKET: THE BURROW; THE EGG 300
XVI THE CRICKET: THE SONG; THE PAIRING 327
XVII THE LOCUSTS: THEIR FUNCTION; THEIR ORGAN OF SOUND 354
XVIII THE LOCUSTS: THEIR EGGS 378
XIX THE LOCUSTS: THE LAST MOULT 401
XX THE FOAMY CICADELLA 424

INDEX 447

TRANSLATOR’S NOTE

I have ventured in the present volume to gather together, under the somewhat loose and inaccurate title of The Life of the Grasshopper, the essays scattered over the Souvenirs entomologiques that treat of Grasshoppers, Crickets, Locusts and such insects as the Cicada, or Cigale, the Mantis and the Cuckoo-spit, or, to adopt the author’s happier and more euphonious term, the Foamy Cicadella. They exhaust the number of the orthopterous and homopterous insects discussed by Henri Fabre.

Chapters I. to VIII., XV., XVI. and XIX. have already appeared, in certain cases under different titles and partly in an abbreviated form, in an interesting miscellany extracted from the Souvenirs, translated by Mr. Bernard Miall and published by the Century Company. This volume, Social Life in the Insect World, is illustrated with admirable photographs of insects, taken from life, and deserves a prominent place on the shelves of every lover of Fabre’s works.

At the moment of writing, the only one of the following essays that has been published before, in my translation, is the first of the three describing the White-faced Decticus, which appeared, in the summer of last year, in the English Review.

Miss Frances Rodwell has again lent me the most valuable assistance in preparing this volume; and I am indebted also to Mr. Osman Edwards and Mr. Stephen McKenna for their graceful rhymed versions of the occasional lyrics that adorn it.

Alexander Teixeira de Mattos.

Chelsea, 1917.