INDIRECT BENEFITS DERIVED FROM INSECTS. 195 



pointed. Mantis fausta, though not as some suppose worshipped by the 

 Hottentots, is yet greatly esteemed by them, and they regard the person 

 upon whom it alights as highly fortunate.^ A similar unnatural ferocity is 

 exhibited by Gryllas campestris, of which, having put the sexes into a 

 box, I found on examining them that the female had begun to make her 

 meal off her companion. The malign aspect of the scorpion leads us to 

 expect from it unnatural cruelty, and its manners fulfil this expectation. 

 Maupertuis put a hundred scorpions together, and a general and murder- 

 ous battle immediately began. Almost all were massacred in the space of 

 a few days without distinction of age or sex, and devoured by the survi- 

 vors. He informs us also that they often devour their own offspring as 

 soon as they are born.^ Spiders are equally ferocious in their habits, 

 fighting sanguinary battles, which sometimes end in the death of both 

 combatants; and the females do not yield to the Mantes in their unnatural 

 cruelty to their mates. Woe be to the male spider that, after an union, 

 does not with all speed make his escape from the fangs of his partner! 

 Nay, De Geer saw one that, in the midst of his preparatory caresses was 

 seized by the object of his attentions, enveloped by her in a web, and 

 then devoured — a sight which, he observes, filled him with horror and 

 indignation.^ 



Such are the benefits which we derive from the insects that keep each 

 other in check. Here they are the destroyers to which we are chiefly 

 indebted ; but we are in another point of view under nearly equal obliga- 

 tions to the destroyed; for they are insects, either wholly or in part, that 

 form the food of some of our most esteemed fishes, and of birds that are 

 not more valuable to us as articles for the table, than as the songsters that 

 enliven our groves. But before proceeding to the details which this view 

 of the subject involves, I ought not to omit pointing out to you that many 

 quadrupeds, which, though not all of direct utility to us, are doubtless of 

 importance in the scale of being, derive a considerable part of their sub- 

 sistence from insects. 



The harmless hedgehog and the mole, to begin at the lower end of the 

 series, are both said to be insectivorous^; the latter devouring large quanti- 

 ties of the wire-worms. The greedy swine will root up whole acres in 

 search of the grubs of cock-chafers, of which they are very fond ; and 

 perhaps the good they do is greater than the harm, if their attack be 

 confined to grass that having been undermined by these grubs would soon 

 die: they also dig up the larvae of the destructive Cicada septendecim, 

 called the American locust^, on which, when in their perfect state, the 

 squirrels are said to grow fat.^ The badger, Lesser informs us, will eat 

 beetles : and its kinsman the bear has.the character of being very fond of 

 ants and of honey ; which last is also said to be a favorite article with the 

 fox, who has sometimes the audacity to overturn bee-hives, and even to 

 attack wasps' nests in search of it. He will also eat beetles. 



Sparrman has given an amusing account of the honey-ratel (Vivella 

 melUvora), which has a particular instinct enabling it to discover bees, and 



' Thunberg's Travels ii. 66. 



* De Geer, vii. 335. ' a Ibid. 180. ■• Bingley, ii. 374. 



* Bingley, iii. 27. e Collinson in Philos. Trans. 1763. 



