40 THE WONDERS OF INSTINCT 



ing. Sleep, which resembles a return to the peace of 

 non-existence, is, like waking, an effort, here of the 

 leg, of the curled tail; there of the claw, of the jaws. 



The transformation is effected about the middle of 

 May and the adult Empusa makes her appearance. She 

 is even more remarkable in figure and attire than the 

 Praying Mantis. Of her youthful eccentricities, she re- 

 tains the pointed miter, the saw-like arm-guards, the long 

 bust, the knee-pieces, the three rows of scales on the lower 

 surface of the belly; but the abdomen is now no longer 

 twisted into a crook and the animal is comelier to look 

 upon. Large pale-green wings, pink at the shoulder and 

 swift in flight in both sexes, cover the belly, which is 

 striped white and green underneath. The male, the 

 dandy sex, adorns himself with plumed antennae, like 

 those of certain Moths, the Bombyx tribe. In respect of 

 size, he is almost the equal of his mate. 



Save for a few slight structural details, the Empusa 

 is the Praying Mantis. The peasant confuses them. 

 When, in spring, he meets the mitered insect, he thinks 

 he sees the common Prego-Dieu, who is a daughter of the 

 autumn. Similar forms would seem to indicate similar- 

 ity of habits. In fact, led away by the extraordinary 

 armor, we should be tempted to attribute to the Empusa 

 a mode of life even more atrocious than that of the 

 Mantis. I myself thought so at first; and any one, rely- 

 ing upon false analogies, would think the same. It is 

 a fresh error : for all her warlike aspect, the Empusa 

 is a peaceful creature that hardly repays the trouble of 

 rearing 1 . 



