90 
Psyche 
[March 
such resistance to the female as he can. From time to time the female 
rests, and may even pause to feed at rosettes of young moss leaves. 
At such times the male becomes enlivened, rights himself, turns the 
length of his body at right angles to the female’s while still holding 
his original grip with his gonostyles, and swiftly (and repeatedly) 
arches backward over the female in an endeavor to gain firm grasp 
of her body with his wings. If he fails and rests, the rebellion of the 
female returns unabated and continues, as just described, until the 
male succeeds in subduing her, or she finally rids herself of him . 4 
Should the male succeed in gaining a firm hold with his stiff, 
spined and hooked wings, he deftly changes grip with his gonostyles 
so that he now faces in the same direction as the female. Once a 
position has been attained from which he can rear backward and to 
the side of the female, and grasp her between her head and mesono- 
tum with his wings, holding her body parallel to his own, he again 
quickly moves his gonostylar grip forward. Once a sufficiently for- 
ward grip with the gonostyles has been gained, the head of the female 
now being behind the male’s forebody, he rears strongly backward a 
number of times and rakes and manipulates the female’s rostrum 
and antennae with his spined wings as he falls forward again. Should 
he gain hold of the female’s pronotum with his wings, he may move 
his gonostylar grip from the female’s legs to clutch one or both 
antennae, and then briefly but smartly, drag her about by the anten- 
nae. Mauling of the antennae is quickly followed by a wholly passive 
state on the part of the female who thereafter stands as though mes- 
merized. Surprisingly, on the initial assault in one case, the male 
seized the female’s antennae with his gonostyles ; that female there- 
upon became submissive without a struggle. 
When the standing female has become passive, the male (still 
anterior to the female and gripping an appendage with his gonostyles) 
again bows backward repeatedly until his groping wings gain a secure 
hold behind her head, to each side of the pro- or mesonotum, with 
the female’s head pressed sharply and to the side by his flank. The 
gonostylar grip is then moved as far posteriorly as the male can 
manage, and the wing grip released. Once the male has the female 
again firmly gripped with his wings, and the gonostyles reach suffi- 
ciently far backwards, he tries to seize the ovipositor with his gono- 
styles; ordinarily several attempts are required, and after each failure 
4 Marechal (1939) misremembers Lestage’s (1920) account when he states 
“c’est la 9 qui saute sur le £, celui-ci cherchant a fuir et a s’en debaras- 
ser!”, and goes on to tell still more of female sexual aggressiveness. 
