8 TRUE TALES OF THE INSECTS. 



insects, the Meloe's in particular, are evidently extremely 

 repulsive to them on account of their secretion. These 

 carnivorous habits by no means figure alone as the 

 sole enormity in the private character of our insects. 

 They are of a most quarrelsome disposition, and can- 

 nibalism trips up the heels of their pugnacity. From 

 their very birth the larvae fight. If two or more adults 

 be shut up together, they engage in a desperate conflict, 

 cutting at each other with their sword-like legs, until 

 one of the belligerents falls in the fray, when the 

 conqueror swallows up his antagonist ; the male, being 

 the smaller, often constitutes the feast. Their manoeuvres 

 while joining battle have been likened to those of 

 hussars with sabres, and sometimes one cleaves the 

 head of the other from the body with a single slash. 



Aware of the pugnacious propensities, the Chinese 

 indulge their talents for gambling by feeding them and 

 keeping them apart in little bamboo cages, and matching 

 them like fighting cocks, laying wagers on the results. 

 The mantidae do not limit their voracity to insects ; they 

 vanquish creatures which, from their size and strength, 

 one would have thought were totally free from their 

 attacks. Large South American species seize, and eat 

 small frogs, lizards, and even birds. Surely little verte- 

 brates, taken by surprise and feeling themselves pressed 

 in the terrible arms, are at once so overcome by terror 

 as to be incapable of offering resistance. 



