To return to the Praying Mantis. The hatching does not take place all over the nest at one time, but rather in sections, in successive swarms which may be separated by intervals of two days or more. The pointed end, containing the last eggs, usually begins. This inversion of chronological order, calling the last to the light of day before the first, may well be due to the shape of the nest. The thin end, which is more accessible [[175]]to the stimulus of a fine day, wakes up before the blunt end, which is larger and does not so soon acquire the necessary amount of heat.
Sometimes, however, although still broken up in swarms, the hatching embraces the whole length of the exit-zone. A striking sight indeed is the sudden exodus of a hundred young Mantes. Hardly does the tiny creature show its black eyes under a scale before others appear instantly, in their numbers. It is as though a certain shock were being communicated from one to another, as though an awakening signal were transmitted, so swiftly does the hatching spread all round. Almost in a moment the median band is covered with young Mantes who run about feverishly, stripping themselves of their rent garments.
The nimble little creatures do not stay long on the nest. They let themselves drop off or else clamber into the nearest foliage. All is over in less than twenty minutes. The common cradle resumes its peaceful condition, prior to furnishing a new legion a few days later; and so on until all the eggs are finished.
I have witnessed this exodus as often as [[176]]I wished to, either out of doors, in my enclosure, where I had deposited in sunny places the nests gathered more or less everywhere during my winter leisure, or else in the seclusion of a greenhouse, where I thought, in my simplicity, that I should be better able to protect the budding family. I have witnessed the hatching twenty times if I have once; and I have always beheld a scene of unforgetable carnage. The round-bellied Mantis may procreate germs by the thousands: she will never have enough to cope with the devourers who are destined to decimate the breed from the moment that it leaves the egg.
The Ants above all are zealous exterminators. Daily I surprise their ill-omened visits on my rows of nests. It is vain for me to intervene, however seriously; their assiduity never slackens. They seldom succeed in making a breach in the fortress: that is too difficult; but, greedy of the dainty flesh in course of formation inside, they await a favourable opportunity, they lie in wait for the exit.
Despite my daily watchfulness, they are there the moment that the young Mantes appear. They grab them by the abdomen, pull [[177]]them out of their sheaths, cut them up. You see a piteous fray between tender babes gesticulating as their only means of defence and ferocious brigands carrying their spolia opima at the end of their mandibles. In less than no time the massacre of the innocents is consummated; and all that remains of the flourishing family is a few scattered survivors who have escaped by accident.
The future assassin, the scourge of the insect race, the terror of the Locust on the brushwood, the dread devourer of fresh meat, is herself devoured, from her birth, by one of the least of that race, the Ant. The ogress, prolific to excess, sees her family thinned by the dwarf. But the slaughter is not long continued. So soon as she has acquired a little firmness from the air and strengthened her legs, the Mantis ceases to be attacked. She trots about briskly among the Ants, who fall back as she passes, no longer daring to tackle her. With her grappling-legs brought close to her chest, like arms ready for self-defence, already she strikes awe into them by her proud bearing.
A second connoisseur in tender meats pays no heed to these threats. This is the little Grey Lizard, the lover of sunny walls. Apprised [[178]]I know not how of the quarry, here he comes, picking up one by one, with the tip of his slender tongue, the stray insects that have escaped the Ants. They make a small mouthful but an exquisite one, so it seems, to judge by the blinking of the reptile’s eye. For each little wretch gulped down, its lid half-closes, a sign of profound satisfaction. I drive away the bold Lizard who ventures to perpetrate his raid before my eyes. He comes back again and, this time, pays dearly for his rashness. If I let him have his way, I should have nothing left.
Is this all? Not yet. Another ravager, the smallest of all but not the least formidable, has anticipated the Lizard and the Ant. This is a very tiny Hymenopteron armed with a probe, a Chalcis, who establishes her eggs in the newly-built nest. The Mantis’ brood shares the fate of the Cicada’s: parasitic vermin attack the eggs and empty the shells. Out of all that I have collected I often obtain nothing or hardly anything. The Chalcis has been that way.
Let us gather up what the various exterminators, known or unknown, have left me. When newly hatched, the larva is of a pale hue, white faintly tinged with yellow. [[179]]The swelling of its head soon diminishes and disappears. Its colour is not long in darkening and turns light-brown within twenty-four hours. The little Mantis very nimbly lifts up her grappling-legs, opens and closes them; she turns her head to right and left; she curls her abdomen. The fully-developed larva has no greater litheness and agility. For a few minutes the family stops where it is, swarming over the nest; then it scatters at random on the ground and the plants hard by.