This is his declaration.  He throws himself timidly on the back of his corpulent companion; he clings to her desperately, and steadies himself.  The prelude to the embrace is generally lengthy, and the embrace will sometimes last for five or six hours.

Nothing worthy of notice occurs during this time.  Finally the two separate, but they are soon to be made one flesh in a much more intimate fashion.  If the poor lover is loved by his mistress as the giver of fertility, she also loves him as the choicest of game.  During the day, or at latest on the morrow, he is seized by his companion, who first gnaws through the back of his neck, according to use and wont, and then methodically devours him, mouthful by mouthful, leaving only the wings.  Here we have no case of jealousy, but simply a depraved taste.

I had the curiosity to wonder how a second male would be received by a newly fecundated female.  The result of my inquiry was scandalous.  The Mantis in only too many cases is never sated with embraces and conjugal feasts.  After a rest, of variable duration, whether the eggs have been laid or not, a second male is welcomed and devoured like the first.  A third succeeds him, does his duty, and affords yet another meal.  A fourth suffers a like fate.  In the course of two weeks I have seen the same Mantis treat seven husbands in this fashion.  She admitted all to her embraces, and all paid for the nuptial ecstasy with their lives.

There are exceptions, but such orgies are frequent.  On very hot days, when the atmospheric tension is high, they are almost the general rule.  At such times the Mantis is all nerves.  Under covers which contain large households the females devour one another more frequently than ever; under the covers which contain isolated couples the males are devoured more eagerly than usual when their office has been fulfilled.

I might urge, in mitigation of these conjugal atrocities, that the Mantis does not commit them when at liberty.  The male, his function once fulfilled, surely has time to wander off, to escape far away, to flee the terrible spouse, for in my cages he is given a respite, often of a whole day.  What really happens by the roadside and in the thickets I do not know; chance, a poor schoolmistress, has never instructed me concerning the love-affairs of the Mantis when at liberty.  I am obliged to watch events in my laboratory, where the captives, enjoying plenty of sunshine, well nourished, and comfortably lodged, do not seem in any way to suffer from nostalgia.  They should behave there as they behave under normal conditions.

Alas! the facts force me to reject the statement that the males have time to escape; for I once surprised a male, apparently in the performance of his vital functions, holding the female tightly embraced—­but he had no head, no neck, scarcely any thorax!  The female, her head turned over her shoulder, was peacefully browsing on the remains of her lover!  And the masculine remnant, firmly anchored, continued its duty!