idly to stroke the upper face of an outstretched wing with the
tip of the finger-nail.

In a moment of hunger, after a fast of some days, the large grey
cricket, which is as large as the Mantis or larger, will be entirely
consumed with the exception of the wings, which are too dry. Two hours
are sufficient for the completion of this enormous meal. Such an orgy is
rare. I have witnessed it two or three times, always asking myself where
the gluttonous creature found room for so much food, and how it
contrived to reverse in its own favour the axiom that the content is
less than that which contains it. I can only admire the privileges of a
stomach in which matter is digested immediately upon entrance, dissolved
and made away with.

The usual diet of the Mantis under my wire cages consists of crickets of
different species and varying greatly in size. It is interesting to
watch the Mantis nibbling at its cricket, which it holds in the vice
formed by its murderous fore-limbs. In spite of the fine-pointed muzzle,
which hardly seems made for such ferocity, the entire insect disappears
excepting the wings, of which only the base, which is slightly fleshy,
is consumed. Legs, claws, horny integuments, all else is eaten.
Sometimes the great hinder thigh is seized by the knuckle, carried to
the mouth, tasted, and crunched with a little air of satisfaction. The
swollen thigh of the cricket might well be a choice "cut" for the
Mantis, as a leg of lamb is for us!

The attack on the victim begins at the back of the neck or base of the
head. While one of the murderous talons holds the quarry gripped by the
middle of the body, the other presses the head downwards, so that the
articulation between the back and the neck is stretched and opens
slightly. The snout of the Mantis gnaws and burrows into this undefended
spot with a certain persistence, and a large wound is opened in the
neck. At the lesion of the cephalic ganglions the struggles of the
cricket grow less, and the victim becomes a motionless corpse. Thence,
unrestricted in its movements, this beast of prey chooses its mouthfuls
at leisure.

CHAPTER VI

THE MANTIS.--COURTSHIP

The little we have seen of the customs of the Mantis does not square
very well with the popular name for the insect. From the term
_Prego-Dieu_ we should expect a peaceful placid creature, devoutly
self-absorbed; and we find a cannibal, a ferocious spectre, biting open
the heads of its captives