CHAPTER IX 

 ANT-LIONS 



A CREATURE that bears the joint name of the king 

 of beasts and the queen of insects raises great 

 expectations as to its quahty. But the ant-Uon has 

 neither the social habit and wisdom of the ant nor the 

 majestic appearance of the lion. In its perfect form, 

 or imago, it is a graceful but plainly colored insect of 

 the Neuroptera, or lace-winged order. In its larval 

 state it is a most unattractive creature, with the fierce 

 appetite of the dragon-fly larvse. 



It feeds largely upon ants, hence its generic title, 

 Myrmeleon, the Greek form of its popular name. There 

 are in all more than three hundred described species of 

 the group Myrmeleonidse, of which about thirty are in 

 the United States. How many of these have the inter- 

 esting habit of taking their prey which has attracted 

 such general attention is not known, at least by the 

 author. But the species whose manners are now to be 

 described, and which is widely distributed in eastern 

 America, is the well known Myrmeleon immaculatus. 



It is the larvse of this and like species whose doings 

 have wrought the family fame. The dragon-flies best 

 known to us, whom the ant-lions so nearly resemble, 

 lay their eggs upon water plants, and the larvae develop 

 in the water, wherein they devour enormous numbers 



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