Evening capital. (Annapolis, Md.) 1884-1910, 1885-07-07

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up to the surface through his carefully
packed and cemcnted hole and comes
out. has dark jacket which envelops
him. and which he ingensously throws
Of after few warm days.
the jacket is a great circumference.
ana he i not full fiedgcd seventeen
year locust, ready for business, until he
gets outside Of it. It seems that the
creatures, in their Iarvm state, are par
ticularly susceptible To- cold and mois-
ture. Accordingly, through their sew
enteen- year sleep, they keep very far
under ground, and Is they begin to
work their way up and out Of their dark
subterranean retreats moisten their
chamber with something that appears to
make it water proof. Their final ap-
pearance is often postponed on account
Of the weather. But in blowing and
otherwise many of them have been
prematurely turned up, and after
getting some sustenance BY hanging on
TO roots as is their won't they have de-
termined to go higher, and have gone
up trees. In a few cases the sun has
dried them enough SO thai they have
been able to split their jackets in the
back, which they do by gradually tear
ing q rent with their hind legs. After
this is done little more sun for the dry
ing process enables the insect to unfold
his wings and fly about.
The last visitation in this section, as
that is the word commonly used, was,
according to number of authorities, in
1868. and it was Professor G. ". Riley,
the entomologist of the agricultural de-
partment at Washington. who first an
nounced that they would surely appear
In different parts of the country this
year. Nearly all the papers of large
belt extending northeasterly through the
State announced their coming. They
have been dug up in nests at Ashland,
found in graves at Westchester, taken out
of cisterns at Reading. turned up in
pillow burrows at Oxford, found stuck in
post-holes at Wilkesbarre, found in a
blackbird shot at Lebanon, and even
taken from the craws of chickens brought
to the city.
But the "Cicada Septemdecim, " which
is the name that Linneus gave il, is not
locust at all, but of the same family as
the common harvest fly, which is its sec
ond cousin. The mystery that has al
ways attended the creature and its strange
peculiarities has led to many popular
errors. OF all the trees in the forest Mr..
Cicada Septemdecim likes the oak the
best, and II is little strange that the
monaTch OF the wood should be so assail-
able by mere nasty little grub. Still
he, or rather she-for it is Mrs. Cicada
that does the business resorts occasion
ally to other forest trees and is frequently
TO be found even on shrubs Indeed,
there seem to be no trees or shrubs that
are exempt from their attacks, except
those of the pine and fir tribe, which
they let severely alone. It is Mr.. Cicada
who makes the havoc. The gentleman
of the family is drummer by profession
and the lady. strange to say. is boss
carpenter. While the male cicada keeps
up tattoo On his drum, the female, who
is said to relish this music amazingly,
saws out a neat little egg basket A
gentleman belonging to the Academy
of Sciences, who is so old that he
has seen four successive crops of
these strange insects, which most of the
present generation never saw in their
lives, saws that close to the side of the
body of the male seventeen year locust
there is a little opening like pocket, in
which is situated a little drum. which is
played upon and beaten by valves. In
the hinder part Of the body of the other
insect is wonderful implement called q
piercer, which has the combined power
Of nm awl and a double-edged saw The
end is spear shaped, and the sides have
sharp little teeth. They bore their hole
obliquely in the pith of the tree, at an
angle of forty. five degrees, and deposit
their eggs in pairs, separated by little
wooden partition. It takes about fifteen
minutes to prepare one of these nests and
fill it with eggs, but it is not unusual for
one insect to make forty or fifty assures
in the same limb She goes thus
from limb to limb and from tree to
tree until her store of from four to five
thousand eggs is exhausted. Then she
lies down and dies. According to most
authorities in iifty-two days, though
some say forty-two, the young insect is
Matched out and is yellow white grub,
which. when an infaIlible instinct, like
that which takes the duck to the water,
drops to the earth and burrows, no mat
ter from what height 'sThis insect,
said Professor Joseph Leidy, the eminent
scientist, sis not a locust The locust
of the Bible is our common grasshopper.
This grub appears in different parts Of
the country every year, but it
takes il seventeen years to develop in
any one place Some years it covers
larger territory than others. It does not
eat the leaves. In fact, in its perfect
state it eats nothing. It's only mission
is reproduction. Before it comes up it
sucks the roots Of trees It Injuries trees
by the female boring them to deposit
her eggs. All the bored limbs and
branches soon drop of Philadelphia
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