Zoology.] NATURAL HISTORY OF VICTORIA. [Insects. 



and holding up the two great raptorial anterior pair of legs in 

 an attitude like that of human prayer, remaining motionless, as if 

 praying, for hours ; attracting the sympathetic respect of religious 

 people, in the more ignorant ages, of Europe and among the 

 Mahomedans of our own thne, and being worshipped by the 

 Hottentots. The name of praying Mantis, or Soothsayer, is 

 popularly given to them in ignorance of their really cruel, stealthy, 

 rapacious habits. The "raptorial legs " are curiously unlike those of 

 any other insects, and resemble jaws with sharp teeth when in 

 action ; they are much thicker and more muscular than the two 

 hinder pairs of legs ; the coxae are very long, and the trochanters 

 short and triaugular ; the femora thick, and with a deep channel on 

 the terminal half of the under-side, the two edges of which are set 

 with long, sharp, tooth -like spines ; the tibiae are short, curved, 

 compressed, and set with a row of tooth-like spines on under edge, 

 ending in a curved sharp point, the whole fitting into the channel 

 between the two rows of teeth in the femora when bent against 

 them or closed. The tarsi are all 5 -jointed and simple and slender ; 

 the first joint nearly as long as all the rest put together. The 

 posterior legs are moderately long and slender, and formed for 

 walking. 



The name Mantis is, not only from the prophet-like customary 

 attitude, but an allusion to their long emaciated forms ; Theocritus 

 being so injudicious as to see a resemblance between them and a 

 thin young girl with long skinny arms — " PraBmacrani ac pre- 

 tenuem puellam, /uavnv." 



The Mantidce are often confounded with the leaf-eating Phasmce 

 (of which examples are figured on our Plates 69, 70, and 79 of 

 Decades vn. and vin.), from which they differ in the raptorial 

 anterior legs, carnivorous habits, and many points of structure. 

 They wait motionless on trees and shrubs for the approach of 

 smaller insects, which they suddenly snap up in the bend of their 

 raptorial fore-legs, tearing them voraciously with their mandibles. 



This is one of the large and rarer species of Mantis, although 

 the first described of the Australian kinds. It is remarkable not 



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