(Chrysopa sp.)
So fragile and delicate does this creature appear that one can but wonder how it exists in the jungle of the grass. It has a disagreeable odor, it is said, and this is perhaps the reason that it holds its own, for it flies so slowly and is so conspicuous that it would otherwise fall a prey to every insectivorous bird and dragon-fly.
Its other self is the Aphis Lion, a wingless but very active creature which hunts for plant lice and when it finds one punctures it with its mandibles, raises it in the air and lets the blood trickle down into its mouth. It sucks eggs, too, and, shameless creature that it is, it sucks those of its own species, or would, at least, if the mother instinct had not taught the winged females to lay their eggs on the ends of long, slender, stiff stems which the undiscriminating larvæ cannot climb, much as a human mother puts the pot of jam on the top shelf where the children cannot get it.
THE WINGED ANT LION
(Myrmeleon immaculatus, De G.)
As with many of these monsters, it is the other self, the larva of the winged ant lion, which is the fascinating study.
This winged form merely lays the egg from which hatches out the soft, spindle-shaped young with jaws like pincers. This little creature at once marks out a tiny circle in some dry, sandy place, and begins to dig a pitfall for its prey, the ants.