The difficulty, however, may be easily got over, by reversing the position of the insect, and raising the head with a needle. The antennae will attract attention by their great length. In the male insect they exceed, while in the female they fall a little short of, the total length of the body. They are well worth examination. Even a low power will show that they consist of a number of joints--usually from seventy-five to ninety. The three basal joints are much larger than the rest, and in the female the third basal is nearly as long as the first. All these joints are thickly set with stiff hairs directed forwards. At the outer side of each antenna is a compound eye, and on the inner side is a pale spot, the _fenestra_, which in the males of some foreign Cockroaches is replaced by a simple eye. If Cockroaches are kept in confinement, and forced out into the light, the constant motion of the antennae will satisfy the observer that they are of great use to their owners. By means of these organs they not only discover their food, but become by some means, probably by the motion of air-waves, aware of danger that threatens them. Belt, in his _Naturalist in Nicaragua_ (p. 110), speaking of the Cockroaches that infest houses in the tropics, says, ‘They are very wary, as they have numerous enemies--birds, rats, scorpions, and spiders; their long, trembling antennae are ever stretched out, vibrating as if feeling the very texture of the air around them; and their long legs quickly take them out of danger.’ It is not given to every one to visit the tropics, but we may all use our eyes in observing the common insects that abound in our country, and in doing this we shall strengthen the habit of observation, and very often find confirmation of what we read of the habits of insects in distant lands. Sir John Lubbock[18], in treating of the sense of smell in Insects, says that ‘Plateau put some food of which cockroaches are fond on a table, and surrounded it with a low circular wall of cardboard. He then put some cockroaches on the table: they evidently scented the food, and made straight for it. He then removed their antennae, after which, as long as they could not see the food, they failed to find it, even though they wandered about quite close to it.’ The large kidney-shaped compound eyes are sure to attract attention. It is worth while to take out and break up an eye, gently washing out the pigment. If we do this, and then examine it with the pocket lens, we shall have some idea of the multiplicity of lenses in the eye of a Cockroach, each of the six-sided facets being a lens.