242 PANTOMIME OF NATURE. 



A pantomime, with its machinery exposed, would be a sorry 

 spectacle, stripped at once of its amusing and surprising cha- 

 racter ; but there are certain pantomimic incidents, of which 

 the theatre is the insect world, and in which the part of 

 harlequin is played by Nature, that cannot be thus marred, for 

 the more they are elucidated the more do they raise our ad- 

 miration, with always room left (be they explained never so 

 wisely) for curiosity and wonder. Of this description are the 

 marvels which compose the history of the " Formica Leo," 

 "Ant Lion," or Ogre of Ants, on which our "Tale of an 

 Ogre " has its foundation, and to which we must now turn 

 for explanation and completion of what, in that, was left 

 imperfect and obscure. 



Under their prominent characteristics, as a trio eminently 

 " Fair and Fierce," we have said something in another place 

 of the "Dragon," the "Scorpion," and the " Lace-wing" 

 flies ; and to these we might have added a fourth, in the 

 allied tribe of Ant Lions, which, "fierce," more cunning, and, 

 finally, as "fair" as they, belong also to the same order 

 of Neuroptera. The Ant Lion is not indeed a frequenter, 

 now-a-days, of Britain ; not exactly, therefore, a subject for 

 our exhibition ; but it has a place in British catalogues, 

 and having, as it would thence appear, been found once, it 

 may still have lurking-places in our island. This conjecture 

 is considered the more probable from its being a native of 

 central France and Switzerland, as well as more southern 



