590 
AETIOITLATA. 
The warlike disposition of the Mantis is put to a cnrious use in China, these insects being 
kept in bamboo cages for prize-fights, like fighting-cocks. At these exhibitions two of them are 
placed face to face; they raise their wings, their bodies tremble, and with the utmost fury they 
rush upon each other. They use their long fore-legs like sabers, giving blow upon blow; some- 
times the fight lasts several minutes. The victor then devours his enemy, which, all things con- 
sidered, is a much more rational termination of a duel than is common among men. Were it 
introduced into the human code of honor, and the victor required to eat his victim, it would 
greatly tend to do away with one of our fashionable barbarisms. 
THR WALKING-LEAF. 
THE PHASMINA. 
This tribe includes some curious insects, one species of which is the Walking-Leaf, Phyllimn 
siccifolium, in which the body is flat and thin, and the wings form large, leaf-like organs, covering 
the whole abdomen, and furnished with regularly reticulated ncrvures, which give them exactly 
the appearance of a leaf. This leafy structure pervades the whole animal ; the legs, especially 
the thighs, being always foliaceous. There are several other species in this country and in Europe. 
In the Walkin-q-Stick, Phasma baculus, the body is much elongated, cylindrical, and usually 
of a dingy brownish color, so as 
closely to resemble the dried twig 
of a tree. This singular insect is 
quite common in Europe. One 
species, the Spectrum femoratiim., 
is frequently seen in the South- 
ern States, and i& occasionally 
found in parts of New York and 
Kew England. 
THE ACHETINA. 
Of this tribe the Common 
Cricket, Acheta domestica^ the 
noisy little denizen of the kitchen- 
hearth, may serve as an example. 
During the colder months these 
THE FiELD-ciucKET. jusBcts scck the habitations of 
