Rensselaer Semi-Weekly Republican, Volume 41, Number 64, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 30 April 1909 — Where Grasshoppers Are Popular. [ARTICLE]

Where Grasshoppers Are Popular.

There is a regular business in Italy of making little wire cages for grasshoppers. The .insect is regarded as lucky and if one can be kept alive in the cage for a month It is believed the year will be prosperous, The superstition arose from this Incident: A cardinal of the Medici family invited a bishop to dine with him In bis garden. The cardinal handed the bishop a glass of wind. A grasshopper fell from a tree into the wine and the bishop did not drink it. The wine was afterward found to have been poisoned.