I have spoken of the repeated coupling of the Praying Mantis and of the tragic end of the male, who is nearly always devoured like an ordinary piece of game. In the space of a fortnight I have seen the same female marry again as many as seven times over. Each time the easily-consoled widow ate up her mate. Such habits make one assume repeated layings; and these do, in fact, take place, though they are not the general rule. Among my mothers, some gave me only one nest; others supplied me with two, both equally large. The most fertile produced three, of which the first two were of normal size, while the third was reduced to half the usual dimensions. The last-mentioned insect shall tell us the population which the Mantis’ ovaries are capable of producing. Reckoning by the transversal furrows of the nest, we can easily count the layers of eggs. These are more or less rich according to their position at the middle of the ellipsoid or at the ends. The numbers of the eggs in the biggest and in the smallest layer furnish an average from which we can approximately deduce the total. In this way I find that a good-sized nest contains about four hundred eggs. The mother with the three nests, the last of which was only half the size of the others, therefore left as her offspring no fewer than a thousand germs; those who laid twice left eight hundred; and the less fertile mothers three to four hundred. In every case, it is a fine family, which would even become cumbrous, if it were not subjected to drastic pruning. The pretty little Grey Mantis is much less lavish. In my cages she lays only once; and her nest contains some sixty eggs at most. Although built on the same principles and likewise fixed in the open, it differs remarkably from the work of the Praying Mantis, first in its scanty dimensions and next in certain details of structure. It is shaped like a shelving ridge. The two sides are curved and the median line projects into a slightly denticulated crest. It is grooved crosswise by about a dozen furrows, corresponding with the several layers of eggs. Here we find no exit-zone, with short, imbricated scales; no snowy ribbon with alternating outlets. The whole surface, including the foundation, is uniformly covered with a shiny red-brown rind, in which the bubbles are very small. One end is ogival in shape; the other, the end where the nest finishes, is abruptly truncated and is prolonged above in a short spur. The whole forms a kernel surrounded by the foamy rind. Like the Praying Mantis, the Grey Mantis works at night, an unfortunate circumstance for the observer.