CHAPTER XXV.

A CHAT ABOUT NATURAL HISTORY.

'Pray, Mr Naturalist,' said a gentle voice, as Horace and a lady walked together, 'how do those noisy insects in the trees there,make so loud a sound?'

'The Cicada, Annie, has a pair of concave membranes, on each side of the first joint of the abdomen. They do make a rattle indeed, and quite enough to disturb anything but the absorbing communion of lovers.'

The last remark was intended to convey a personal meaning, and was duly enforced by pathos in delivery, and beaming glances as an accompaniment. A blush was the response, although no ill-humour was positively manifested.

Will it please you, sir, to keep to your Cicada text?' said she. You are at liberty to enlarge upon it.'

'I bow to your imperial will. Our noisy friend of the rattle has but a short time to beat its drum,-only six weeks. The juices of plants suffice for its meals. After depositing its tiny eggs by puncturing the tree, it abandons the world. As soon as the grub comes forth, it rolls out of its cave, drops to the ground, and crawls down to the roots, where it buries itself to feed on their juices at leisure. As if to compensate for the

brevity of its mirth, while flying from tree to tree in the sun, and joining in a tumultuous concert, the grub is permitted to enjoy a dark subterranean existence for a dozen years or more.'

'That is a sad story, Horace, I could have liked it the other way.'

'Nature is very wayward, you see. Remember, though, you have not your wings yet, my fair one; and you may have to pledge your sweet word to grub along with me in this gloomy world, though it be even fifty years.'

'That is another story altogether. But then, you know, I might fancy I lived not in the darkness when under your eye.'

'Most loyally said, dear friend. You make me chirrup like the cicada. But do you admire the clicking of the grasshopper?'

That active tribe are no especial favourites of mine. They spring upon my dress, poke their legs in my shoes, and dash rudely against me as I walk in the grass. But tell me if it be true that our colonial grasshoppers are the true locust?'

'They are more like crickets, another noisy set. But while these have their wing-covers folding horizontally, the grasshoppers have them in a rooflike position. The last differ again from the locust in inferior robustness of body, as well as length and slenderness of legs and antennæ. Our grasshoppers have, as you may have observed, considerable leaping

powers; but the locusts spring further on their long and strong hind legs.'

'Where is the drum of our musical leaper?'

'It has a pair of taborets, formed of thin, transparent membrane stretched in strong half oval frame in the triangular overlapping portion of each wing

cover.'

'I wish all mischievous things gave a beat of their drum in the bush, that we might be warned of their approach.'

'Do you include my sex among the mischievous things?'

Oh, they do give warning pretty often by silly speeches.'

'Thank you for the compliment.'

'But you know,' observed she with a sly look, 'present company are always excepted. I was thinking of other charming deceivers,-snakes, for instance.'

'Poor things, they do their best to get away from you, as I did at one time of day, until you, with serpent's eyes'

'Stop!' cried the lady in an attempted fury, ‘if you dare.' Here she looked so awful that the gentleman proceeded quietly with his lecture.

'I was going to say that snakes are harmless enough. I admit it is ugly to come in sight of one, as we did in a short walk on the sand-ridge. Some have got bitten, but some, also, have been suffocated with a piece of meat.'

But surely you don't mean to say snakes in Tasmania and Australia are dove-like in nature?'

'People anyhow frighten themselves without occasion. There is Mr Gerard Krefft, who had such a cluster of snaky pets at his Sydney Museum, to the dread of all approachers, and better than watch-dogs for his premises; he will assure you that the chances are ever so many to one against your being hurt by a snake.'

'His assertions will not diminish my fright at the sight of one.'

'And yet, Annie, he finds all over these Australian regions only five species of poisonous ones out of eighty.'

'Quite enough too, for any one's comfort in the bush.'

But you must know that this little island has not all of the fatal five species. I need not describe to a colonial girl the features of the Diamond Snake, pretty enough to captivate any, but fearfully venomous. But I would contrast it with the Australian Tiger Snake. Both are brown, though the latter is banded. The first has two outer rows of scales with reddish yellow spots, and the second has the two rows paler than the rest. The scales of the head are more elongated in the former. The head of the Australian is twice the size of the other; and, while its neck is very flat, the other is rather round. The Tasmanian scales are in fifteen rows, while the Continental are in eighteen.'

'Well, after so luminous a description of these charmers, you may restore them to the Museum, and bottle them up. I would counsel you to avoid the fate of Underwood, our Colonial snake tamer, who found the Tiger such a Tiger.'

'But the poor fellow wanted to sell his antidote. The Indian Jugglers pull out the teeth of their snakes, but he only broke those of his, not thinking of their growing again. Professor Halford of Melbourne has been the means of saving life by introducing ammonia to the blood of the sufferer.'

'You have said nothing of the Black Snake, so common with us here, and so fond of water to swim in. I have seen it catch frogs and water rats.'

'I don't approve of its fashion of darting at one, especially as it is so venomous, though only some six feet long. Its scales are in seventeen rows. How lucky its winter retirement under ground keeps us safe half the year! Yet far more risk is encountered from English vipers than Tasmanian snakes, which are too glad to get out of the way.'

'O do please, Mr Professor, close this subject,' entreated the young lady, 'I could sooner put up with Paleozoic and Labyrinthodon.'

'Be thankful you are not in Queensland, with alligators from twelve to twenty feet long.'

'I certainly prefer our own dear little lizards. They are harmless enough, Horace. I have made pets of them. They are so fond of bread and milk.'