MAXTICHOUA MYGALOIDES. 



CHAPTER XVIII. 



TROPICAL INSECTS, SPIDERS, AND SCORPIONS. 



Gradual increase of Insect Life on advancing towards the Lin« — The Hercules 

 Beetle— The Goliath— The Inca Beetle— The Walking-leaf, and Walking-stick 

 Insects — The Soothsayer — Luminous Beetles — Tropical Spiders — Their gaudy- 

 colours — Trap-door Spiders — Enemies of the Spiders — Mortal Combat between 

 a Spider and a Cockroach — 'Tropical Scorpions — Dreadful effects of their 

 sting. 



ON advancing from the temperate regions to the line, we 

 find the insects gradually increasing with the multiplicity 

 of plants, and at length attaining the greatest size, brilliancy 

 of colour, and variety of form in those tropical lands where 

 moisture combines with heat in covering the ground with 

 a dense and everlasting vegetation. Our largest insects 

 are indeed mere pygmies when compared with their tropical 

 relatives. We have no tiger-beetle to equal the ferocious 

 Mantichora of South Africa, which, hiding beneath stones 

 from the terrible glare of the sun, darts quickly from its place 

 of concealment upon its ill-fated prey ; nor a stag-beetle of the 

 size of the Odontolabris Cuvera of China and Northern India. 

 Our largest dung-feeding Lamellicorns look but small near the 

 African Copris Hamadryas ; and our cockchafer, though con- 

 spicuous among our native insects, is a dwarf when confronted 



