292 SCIENTIFIC ILLUSTRATIONS [Qua 



The Quarrelsome Character. 



The Mantis oratoria is a singular insect. Nothing equals 

 the ferocity of these Orthoptera. If two of them are shut up 

 together, they engage in a desperate combat ; they deal each 

 other blows with their front legs, and do not leave off fencing 

 till the stronger of the two has succeeded in eating off the other's 

 head. From their very birth the larvae attack each other. The 

 male being smaller than the female, is often its victim. Kirby 

 tells us that in China the children procure them as in France 

 they do cockchafers, and shut them up in bamboo cages to 

 enjoy the exciting spectacle of their combats. There exist men 

 and women whose disposition for quarrelling resembles that of 

 the Mantis oratoria. They are born Avith the instinct for 

 quarrelling. It asserts itself in the earliest stages of childhood, 

 and grows stronger and stronger with years. It is enough for 

 any two of them to be together to be sure of a disagreement. 

 They never require a subject for quarrelling about ; they indulge 

 in quarrelling because it is their nasty nature. j. 



The Blunders of Quarrelsomeness. 



Quarrelsome people remind the observer of the sea-crabs. 

 Sea-crabs are naturally quarrelsome, and have serious con- 

 tests together by means of their formidable claws, with which 

 they lay hold of their adversary's legs, and wherever they seize 

 it is not easy to make them forego their hold. The animal 

 seized has therefore no alternative but to leave part of the leg 

 behind in token of victory. Such are the blunders of quarrel- 

 someness that a crab, when irritated, and made to seize one of 

 its own small claws with a large one, does not distinguish that 

 it is itself the aggressor, but exerts all its strength, and cracks 

 the shell of its own small claw, thereby injuring itself, as quarrel- 

 some people always do. Feeling itself wounded, it casts off the 

 piece in the usual place, but continues to retain the hold with 

 the great claw for a long time afterwards ; the very picture of 

 quarrelsomeness making itself and its own injuries a matter for 

 ridicule. The quarrelsome man loses power ; he needlessly in- 

 jures himself like the crab ; he strikes out to attack other?, 



