THE MANTIS. 



Superstitious notions Remarkable patience. 



times to the left, the country people of the same 

 province have attributed to this animal another 

 very useful quality, that of obligingly showing 

 the way to strangers. " It is so divine a crea- 

 ture," says the translator of MoufTet, " that if a 

 child has lost its way, and enquires of the man- 

 tis, it will point out the right path with its paw." 

 We are told by Dr. Smith, in his Tour on the 

 Continent, that a gentleman caught a male and 

 female, and put them together in a glass vessel. 

 The female, which in this, as in most other in- 

 sects, is the largest, after a while devoured first 

 the head and upper parts of her companion, and 

 afterwards all the remainder of the body. 



The young are preserved in the egg-state in a 

 Jdnd of oblong bag, of a thick spungy substance; 

 this bag is imbricated on the outside, and fas- 

 tened lengthwise lo the branch of some plant. 

 As the eggs ripen they are protruded through 

 the thick substance of the bag, and the larva, 

 which are about half an inch in length, burst 

 from them. The males die in October, and the 

 females soon follow them. 



The patience of this insect in waiting for its 

 prey, is remarkable, and the posture to which 

 superstition has attributed devotion is no other 

 than the means it uses to catch it. When it 

 has fixed its eyes on an insect, it very rarely loses 

 sight of it, though it may cost some hours to 

 take it. If it see an insect a little beyond its 

 reach, over its head, it slowly erects its longtho- 

 . 45. 2 o 



