Lesson LXXXI

The Katydid

Leading thought—The katydids resemble the long-horned grasshoppers and the crickets. They live in trees, and the male sings “katy-did” by means of a musical instrument similar to that of the cricket.

Method—Place a katydid in a cricket cage in the schoolroom, giving it fresh leaves or flowers each day, and encouraging the pupils to watch it at recess. It may be placed in a vial and passed around, for close observation. In studying this insect, use the lesson on the red-legged grasshopper and also that on the cricket. These lessons will serve to call the attention of the pupils to the differences and resemblances between the katydid and these two allied insects.

THE BLACK CRICKETS

Of the insect musicians the cricket is easily the most popular. Long associated with man, as a companion of the hearth and the field, his song touches ever the chords of human experience. Although we, in America, do not have the house-cricket which English poets praise, yet our field-crickets have a liking for warm corners, and will, if encouraged, take up their abode among our hearthstones. The greatest tribute to the music of the cricket is the wide range of human emotion which it expresses. “As merry as a cricket” is a very old saying and is evidence that the cricket’s fiddling has ever chimed with the gay moods of dancers and merrymakers. Again, the cricket’s song is made an emblem of peace; and again we hear that the cricket’s “plaintive cry” is taken as the harbinger of the sere and dying year. From happiness to utter loneliness is the gamut covered by this sympathetic song. Leigh Hunt found him glad and thus addresses him:

“And you, little housekeeper who class
With those who think the candles come too soon,
Loving the fire, and with your tricksome tune
Nick the glad, silent moments as they pass.”

Ways of the Six-Footed.