248 



MOTIONS OF INSECTS. 



those in the other orders, can move in all directions ; back- 

 wards, and towards both sides, as well as forwards. Bonnet 

 mentions a spider (not a spinner) that always walked back- 

 wards when it attacked a large insect of its own tribe ; but 

 when it had succeeded in driving it from a captive fly, which, 

 however, it did not eat, it walked forwards in the ordinary 

 way. 1 



Insects vary much in their walking paces : some crawling 

 along, others walking slowly, and others moving with a very 

 quick step. The field cricket (Gryllus campestris) creeps 

 very slowly — the bloody-nose beetle ( Timarcha tenebricosa) 

 and the oil-beetle (Meloe Proscarabaus) march very leisurely ; 

 the spider-wasps (PompUus) walk by starts, as it were, 

 vibrating their wings at the same time without expanding 

 them; while flies, ichneumons, wasps, &c, and many 

 beetles, walk as fast as they can. One insect, a kind 

 of snake-fly {Mantispa pagana), is said to walk upon its 

 knees. The crane-flies (Tipula oleracea) and shepherd- 

 spiders (Plialangium) have legs so disproportionately long, 

 that they seem to walk upon stilts ; but when we consider 

 that they have to walk over and amongst grass — ■ the former 

 laying its eggs in meadows — we shall see the reason of this 

 conformation. Insects do not always walk in a right line ; 

 for I have often observed the little midges {Psychoda Latr.), 

 when walking up glass, moving alternately from right to left 

 and from left to right, as humble-bees fly, so as to describe 

 small zigzags. 



Numerous are the insects that run. Almost all the 

 predaceous tribes, the black dors, clocks, or ground-beetles 

 (Eutrechina), and their fellow destroyers the Cicindelce, and 

 other Eitpterina — which Linne, with much propriety, has 

 denominated the tigers of the insect world — are gifted with 

 uncommon powers of motion, and run with great rapidity. 

 The velocity, in this respect, of ants is also very great. 

 Mr. Delisle observed a fly — so minute as to be almost in- 

 visible — which ran nearly three inches in a demi-second, and in 

 that space made 540 steps. Consequently it could take a 



1 (Euvr. ii. 426. 



