ACTS WELL ITS PART 225 



apprehension and alarm. I have had these strange 

 creatures under observation many weeks, and invariably 

 found that when one was interfered with in any way it used 

 its snake-like aft end as a bogey, curving it round towards 

 the molesting hand. A fowl that will attack an 8-inch 

 centipede without hesitation, makes a sensational fuss and 

 clatter when it detects a stick insect, especially when the 

 stick insect feints, however ineffectually, with its perfectly 

 harmless tail. If it is capable of imposing upon a sagacious 

 fowl, the effect of its terrifying aspect upon an unsophisti- 

 cated little bird can well be understood. 



Richard Kerr, the author of Nature : Curious and Beauti- 

 ful, describes a specimen of the stick insect from a cabinet 

 specimen and a pen-and-ink drawing in the museum of the 

 Hon. W. Rothschild, at Tring. This particular insect 

 originally came from Malacca, and is jointed somewhat 

 after the style of a Malacca cane, and of it the author says — 

 " It is said that when the insect is attacked by its foe, or is 

 in danger of attack, it has the power to protrude telescopic- 

 ally the tenth (terminal) segment, which has a mouth-like 

 opening and a tongue-like organ which at once gives the 

 creature the appearance of a snake. There is also a spot 

 that answers to the appearance of an eye on the ninth 

 segment." 



The Dunk Island representative of the family does not 

 possess the power of protruding and withdrawing its 

 terminal segment, but it certainly assumes a resemblance 

 to a snake, and a pugnacious snake too. Further, the 

 Tring insect does not appear to possess wings. My friend 

 does — though she flies as the Scotchman admitted he 

 joked — "wi' deefeeculty." She spreads her light, gauzy, 

 grey, and shockingly inadequate, skirts, and romps and 

 rollicks away, giving one a fleeting impression of a bold and 

 most disorderly ballet girl. " She " is quite the proper 

 mode of address, for there can be no mistake as to the sex. 



The male is a slim individual, not half the length, and 

 about one-fourth of the circumference of the female. 

 Though (unlike his consort) he is in his general demeanour 



