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According to Sparmann, the Nubians and Hottentots regard mantides as tutelary divinities, and worship them as such. A monkish legend tells us that Saint Francis Xavier, having perceived a mantis holding its legs toward heaven, ordered it to sing the praises of God, when immediately the insect struck up one of the most exemplary of canticles!
Westwood, J.O., on the classification of the Hymenoptera; on the Culicidae and Tabanidae; on a Hymenopterous parasite with a sedentary male; on the proportions of the sexes in Lucanus cervus and Siagonium; on the absence of ocelli in female Mutillidae; on the jaws of Ammophila; on the copulation of insects of distinct species; on the male of Crabro cribrarius; on the pugnacity of the male Tipulae; on the stridulation of Pirates stridulus; on the Cicadae; on the stridulating organs of the cricket; on Ephippiger vitium; on Pneumora; on the pugnacity of the Mantides; on Platyblemnus; on difference in the sexes of the Agrionidae; on the pugnacity of the males of a species of Tenthredinae; on the pugnacity of the male stag-beetle; on Bledius taurus and Siagonium; on lamellicorn beetles; on the coloration of Lithosia.
Like the Mantis-killing Tachytes, she hunts the various Mantides of the countryside, consisting mainly of the Praying Mantis; only her large size requires them to be more fully developed, without however having attained the form and the dimensions of the adult. She places three to five of them in each cell.
Guided by her instinct, which rivals the science of a Latreille, she groups them all together. This instinctive taxonomy becomes more surprising still if we consider the variety of the game stored in a single burrow. The Mantis-killing Tachytes, for instance, preys indiscriminately upon all the Mantides that occur in her neighbourhood.
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