42 THE WONDERS OF INSTINCT 



The laying follows close upon the disappearance of the 

 males. 



One word more on comparative manners. The Man- 

 tis goes in for battle and cannibalism; the Empusa is 

 peaceable and respects her kind. To what cause are 

 these profound moral differences due, when the organic 

 structure is the same? Perhaps to the difference of diet. 

 Frugality, in fact, softens character, in animals as in 

 men; gross feeding brutalizes it. The gormandizer 

 gorged with meat and strong drink, a fruitful source of 

 savage outbursts, could not possess the gentleness of the 

 ascetic who dips his bread into a cup of milk. The Man- 

 tis is that gormandizer, the Empusa that ascetic. 



Granted. But whence does the one derive her vora- 

 cious appetite, the other her temperate ways, when it 

 would seem as though their almost identical structure 

 ought to produce an identity of needs? These insects 

 tell us, in their fashion, what many have already told us : 

 that propensities and aptitudes do not depend exclusively 

 upon anatomy ; high above the physical laws that govern 

 matter rise other laws that govern instincts. 



