I have spoken of the many embraces to which the Praying Mantis submits, and of the tragic end of the male, who is almost invariably devoured as though a lawful prey.  In the space of a fortnight I have known the same female to adventure upon matrimony no less than seven times.  Each time the readily consoled widow devoured her mate.  Such habits point to frequent laying; and we find the appearance confirmed, though not as a general rule.  Some of my females gave me one nest only; others two, the second as capacious as the first.  The most fruitful of all produced three; of these the two first were of normal dimensions, while the third was about half the usual size.

From this we can reckon the productivity of the insect’s ovaries.  From the transverse fissures of the median zone of the nest it is easy to estimate the layers of eggs; but these layers contain more or fewer eggs according to their position in the middle of the nest or near the ends.  The numbers contained by the widest and narrowest layers will give us an approximate average.  I find that a nest of fair size contains about four hundred eggs.  Thus the maker of the three nests, of which the last was half as large as the others, produced no less than a thousand eggs; eight hundred were deposited in the larger nests and two or three hundred in the smaller.  Truly a fine family, but a thought ungainly, were it not that only a few of its members can survive.

Of a fair size, of curious structure, and well in evidence on its twig or stone, the nest of the Praying Mantis could hardly escape the attention of the Provencal peasant.  It is well known in the country districts, where it goes by the name of tigno; it even enjoys a certain celebrity.  But no one seems to be aware of its origin.  It is always a surprise to my rustic neighbours when they learn that the well-known tigno is the nest of the common Mantis, the Prego-Dieu.  This ignorance may well proceed from the nocturnal habits of the Mantis.  No one has caught the insect at work upon her nest in the silence of the night.  The link between the artificer and the work is missing, although both are well known to the villager.

No matter:  the singular object exists; it catches the eye, it attracts attention.  It must therefore be good for something; it must possess virtue of some kind.  So in all ages have the simple reasoned, in the childlike hope of finding in the unfamiliar an alleviation of their sorrows.

By general agreement the rural pharmacopoeia of Provence pronounces the tigno to be the best of remedies against chilblains.  The method of employment is of the simplest.  The nest is cut in two, squeezed and the affected part is rubbed with the cut surface as the juices flow from it.  This specific, I am told, is sovereign.  All sufferers from blue and swollen fingers should without fail, according to traditional usage, have recourse to the tigno.