Birds and Nature, Vol. 08, No. 1, June 1900: In Natural ColorsVarious
History
Birds and Nature, Vol. 08, No. 1, June 1900: In Natural Colors
Various
Birds -- Periodicals; Natural history -- Periodicals
The katydids, crickets, grasshoppers and other musical insects are all
exaggerated in the tropics, assuming giant form. Thus their cries are
proportionately louder.
There is an East Indian cicada which makes a remarkably loud noise. It
is called by the natives "dundub," which means drum. From this name
comes that of the genus which is known as _Dundubia_. This is one of
the few scientific terms from Sanskrit.
Entomologists have succeeded in recording the cries of many insects by
the ordinary system of musical notation. But this method does not show
the actual pitch, which is usually several octaves above the staff. It
merely serves to express the musical intervals.
It is known with reasonable certainty that many insects have voices
so highly pitched that they cannot be heard with the human ear. One
evidence of this fact is that some people can distinguish cries of
insects which are not audible to others. But even if there are a few
notes lost to many of us, there is enough insect music to prove vastly
entertaining to those who take interest in the insect world, and the
peculiar methods of its inhabitants in communicating with each other.
DOMESTIC ANIMALS
CATTLE.
Cattle is a term applied to the whole of that large variety of domestic
animals known as the Bovine family. Naturalists have divided them into
two primary groups--the hump-backed cattle (_Bos Indicus_) and the
straight-backed cattle (_Bos Taurus_).
Some naturalists claim that these two groups are really only different
varieties of the same species, while others claim that the marked
differences in structure, habits and voice are such as would indicate a
specific distinction.
The hump-backed variety is chiefly found in India and Africa, while the
straight-backed cattle are common in all parts of the globe. Cattle
seem to have been domesticated as far back as written and traditional
history will take us.
The remains of the cow and the ox have been found as a part of the
many evidences of the oldest civilizations, their bones having been
discovered in the same caves with stone axes and stone knives. That
the cow contributed immensely to the earlier civilizations cannot be
doubted. Besides contributing to the daily bill of fare she became the
common beast of burden, drawing the rudest of plows, sleds and carts,
and in fact she does the same to-day to some extent in many parts of
the world.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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