174 



NATURAL HISTORY OF ARTHROPODS. 



They are bloodthirsty creatures, and are forever quarrelling and at enmity among 

 themselves, as well as with all other insects. Many a fierce battle is fought by the 

 males in which neither eye nor limb is spared, and in which the winner ends by making 

 a repast off the body of the vanquished. They are so void of feeling that the male (the 

 female being the strongest and most voracious) risks his life in courting, and usually 

 succeeds only by slyly and suddenly surprising his mate, who, after accepting his 

 embrace, often coolly seizes and devours him. So tenaciously do these insects fight 

 that they will continue without cessation or inconvenience for some minutes after the 

 loss of their heads. We have seen a female, decapitated and with her body partly 

 eaten, slip away from another that was devouring her, and for over an hour after- 

 wards fight as tenaciously and with as much nonchalance as though nothing had 

 happened. 



The most common representative of the family in the United States is Phasmo- 

 mantis Carolina. The eggs of this species are laid in a packet about an inch in length, 



FIG. 250. PJtasmomantis Carolina, praying mantis. 



and attached to twigs and leaf-stalks. The species is quite common through various 

 portions of the South and Southwest. Its food consists mainly of flies, though it is a most 

 voracious cannibal and will devour its own kind as well as any other insect that comes 

 within its grasp. It has been known to attack butterflies, grasshoppers, and caterpil- 

 lars of various kinds, and in one instance a single female devoured eleven Colorado 

 potato-beetles during one night, leaving only the wing cases and parts of the legs. It 

 disdains all dead food, and never makes chase for the living, but warily, patiently, and 

 motionless it watches till its victim is within reach of its fore-arms, and then clutches 

 it with a sudden and rapid motion. The newly-hatched larva is light yellowish-brown, 

 but after the second moult, many of them become green. This last color is retained by 

 most of the females, while the males, at maturity, are more often gray. 



"We know with what fear the hawk is regarded by the great majority of small birds, 

 but that at the same time the common bee-martin defies, and even tantalizes and drives 

 it off. In like manner the mantis, which must be the dread of most flies, is defied by 

 certain parasitic species belonging to the genera Tachina and SarcopTiagra, and we 

 have found no less than nine maggots in the body of a female mantis, which must have 



