16 JOURNAL OF THE TRINIDAD 



he a formidable fellow — he looked wild enough, small as he 

 was, with his prominent eyes, the marvellous mobility of his 

 parts and especially of his feelers. In his larval stage he digs 

 little holes in which he waylays ants and other creatures. In 

 his perfect state his character does not improve, for he is the 

 terror of all other insects of his own weight and size, while to the 

 smaller ones he must be a perfect ogre. Our tiger beetle dis- 

 posed of, we resumed our walk and found at the head of the 

 ravine that the stream crossed the road twice. Hovering over 

 the water weie some delicate dragon flies* which did not seem so 

 hungry as the larger species, which fly about in the evening and 

 whose sole object in life is eating. Dragon flies are veritable 

 tyrants of the air. Their youth is spent in water where 

 they work no less havoc- among the other inhabitants. To 

 do this they are furnished with a special apparatus ; their 

 jaws are developed into a horrible pair of long arms which they 

 f )ld up over their faces, when they look like a mask. These they 

 suddenly stretch out when they seize their helpless prey. We 

 had now arrived at a cleanly kept cocoa estate, where we found 

 another species of " tic tack" in which we did not find any strong 

 points of interest. This, however, could not be said of a pair of 

 small grey praying mantis* which moved rather faster than these 

 creatures do generally and like many other animals, much higher 

 in the scale of creation, they persistently placed the bough on which 

 they rested between ourselves and them. Their colour afforded 

 one more instance of protective mimicry. We also noted some 

 fine wood peckers busily searching the bark of the cocoa trees 

 for the grubs which do so much harm to the planters' crops. 

 We soon came upon the proprietor himself, a fine old gentleman 

 engaged in breaking cocoa pods, with whom we had a short chat 

 upon the prospects of the next crop, and cocoa pests in the shape of 

 rats and squirrels. He said he was much troubled by these 

 animals and that he was careful not to kill snakes when he 

 found them, as he believed they ate the rats. Such a sentiment 

 coming from such a source, greatly surprised us, as country people, 

 as a rule, are possessed of the idea that snakes should be killed 

 wherever met. After we had rested, we started on our home- 

 ward journey, catching on the way a stick insect. Stick insects 

 are not at all common, many people think, but at night, on a damp 

 bank, they may be found by hundreds. When we reached the 

 hunting ants' nest, at the risk of some terrible bites my friend 

 thrust his hand into the midst of the mass of insects and captured 

 several hundreds, which, with many a vigorous stamp and hasty 

 exclamation, were soon imprisoned in a pocket handkerchief for 



Now teing identified. 



