256 MEANS OF DEFENCE OF INSECTS. 
them: in this quality, however, they are by no means 
deficient; for, their diminutive size considered, they are, 
many of them, the most valiant animals in nature. The 
giant bulk of an elephant would not deter a hornet, a 
bee, or even an ant, from attacking it, if it was provoked. 
I once observed a small spider walking in my path. On 
putting my stick to it, it immediately turned round as if 
to defend itself. On the approach of my finger, it lifted 
itself up and stretched out its legs to meet it.—In Ray’s 
Letters mention is made of a singular combat between a 
spider and a toad fought at Hetcorne near Sittinghurst* 
in Kent; but as the particulars and issue of this famous 
duel are not given, I can only mention the circumstance, 
and conjecture that the spider was victorious?! ‘Terri- 
ble as is the dragon-fly to the insect world in general, 
putting to flight and devouring whole hosts of butterflies, 
may-flies, and others of its tribes, it instills no terror into 
the stout heart of the scorpion-fly (Panorpa communis, 
L.), though much its inferior in size and strength. Ly- 
onet saw one attack a dragon-fly of ten times its own 
bigness, bring it to the ground, pierce it repeatedly with 
its proboscis; and had he not by his eagerness parted 
them, he doubts not it would have destroyed this tyrant 
of the insect creation °. 
When the death’s-head hawk-moth was introduced by 
Huber into a nest of humble--bees, they were not affect- 
ed by it, like the hive-bees, but attacked it and drove it 
merous. They are very active, and have been observed to take flies 
by surprise. A person stung by one of them lost his senses in five 
minutes, and was so ill for several days that his life was despaired of. 
4 Hedcorne near Sittingbourne ? 
> Dr. Long in Ray’s Letters, 370. © Lesser L. i, 263, Note t. 
