(>68 



CLASS IV. INSECTA. 



9. Oxyhaloinae. Hypnorma has brightly coloured antennae 

 and a median suture between the tegmina like that of a beetle ; the 

 head also is visible from above ; Diploptera Sauss. ; Oxyhaloa Br. 



10. Perisphaeriinae. Gromphadorhina, a wingless form from 

 Madagascar with a stout body over three inches in length. Pseudo- 

 glomeris, whose name recalls its resemblance to the pill -millipede 

 Glomeris. 



11. Panesthiinae. Panesthia Serv. ; Plana Br. ; Dasyposoma ; 

 Parahormetica. 



12. Geoscapheurinae, a recent sub-family established for an 

 extraordinary digging insect from Australia. 



Fam. 4. Mantidae. Head bent down. Prothorax usually elongated 

 and bearing a pair of large raptorial legs with free coxae, tarsi 5- jointed, 

 with no pad (arolium) between the two claws. The second and third pair 

 of legs simpler. Two -jointed anal styles. 



The soothsayers or praying-insects have very mobile heads, so bent 

 down in some species that the mouth points almost backwards. The second 

 maxillae have hardly fused to form a labium. 

 The femur and tibia of the anterior legs are 

 toothed, and the tibia shuts down into the 

 femur with much the same action as that of the 

 blade of a pocket knife shutting into the handle. 

 With this the Mantis seizes its prey for the 

 most part small insects gliding towards them 

 with sluggish but stealthy movements. W hen at 

 rest the front part of the body is raised, and the 

 anterior legs are usually lifted in an attitude of 

 prayer, which gives an innocent but entirely 

 misleading appearance to the insect. In their 

 chief features the wings are not unlike those of 

 the Blattidae, but are perhaps more developed. 

 Many of the Mantidae have a quiet inconspic- 

 uous appearance, but others show a remarkable 

 resemblance to the structures on which they 

 rest. Thus the Indian Amorphoscelis annulicor- 

 nis mimics the bark of trees : Eremiaphila, which 

 lives in deserts, is almost indistinguishable from 

 the sandy soil ; whilst the young of Hymenopus 

 bicornis and Gongylus gongyloides simulate flowers 

 of varying hue. Harpax ocellata is said to change 

 colour like a chameleon. The number of species 

 of Mantidae is put at about 600 ; they are 

 largely tropical. Some dozen or more are met 

 with in the Mediterranean area, and Mantis 

 religiosa occurs as far north as central France, but there are no British 

 species. The eggs are laid in a peculiar ootheca formed by a foam-like 

 fluid which exudes with the ova, and which as it hardens in the air is 

 moulded by the tips of the fore-wings. M . religiosa lays in the autumn 

 and the young forms emerge during the following June (Fig. 420). They 

 then leave the ootheca but remain attached to it by a silken thread 

 fastened to their cerci ; only after their first moult do they become free. 

 The species are grouped in six sub-families : 



1. Amorphoscelinae. Paraoxypilufs Sauss. ; Discothera Bon. and 



FIG. 420. Egg-case of 

 Mantis with young escap- 

 ing. A the case with 

 young in their position of 

 suspension ; B cerci of 

 the young form mag- 

 nified, showing the sus- 

 pensory threads (after 

 Brongniart). 



