My failure has its lessons. It seems to point to a transition diet which I have not been able to discover. Long ago, the larvæ of the Oil-beetles gave me a great deal of trouble, before I knew that they want as their first food the egg of the Bee whose store of honey they will afterwards consume. Perhaps the young Mantes also in the beginning demand a special pap, something more in keeping with their frailty. Despite its resolute air, I do not quite see the feeble little creature hunting. The game, whatever it be, kicks out, when attacked, frisks about, defends itself; and the assailant is not yet in a condition to ward off even the flap of a Midge’s wing. Then what does it feed on? I should not be surprised if there were interesting facts to be picked up in this baby-food question. These fastidious ones, so difficult to provide with nourishment, meet with even more pitiful deaths than hunger. When only just born, they fall a prey to the Ant, the Lizard and other ravagers who lie in wait, patiently, for the exquisite provender to hatch. The egg itself is not respected. An infinitesimal perforator inserts her own eggs in the nest through the barrier of solidified foam, thus settling her offspring, which, maturing earlier, nips the Mantis’ family in the bud. How many are called and how few are chosen! There were a thousand of them perhaps, sprung from one mother who was capable of giving birth to three broods. One couple alone escapes extermination, one alone keeps up the breed, seeing that the number remains more or less the same from year to year. Here a serious question arises. Can the Mantis have acquired her present fecundity by degrees? Can she, as the ravages of the Ant and others reduced her progeny, have increased the output of her ovaries so as to make up for excessive destruction by excessive production? Could the enormous brood of to-day be due to the wastage of former days? So think some, who are ready, without convincing proofs, to see in animals even more profound changes brought about by circumstances. In front of my window, on the sloping margin of the pond, stands a magnificent cherry-tree. It came there by accident, a sturdy wilding, disregarded by my predecessors and to-day respected far more for its spreading branches than for its fruit, which is of very indifferent quality. In April it forms a splendid white-satin dome. Its blossoms are as snow; their fallen petals carpet the ground. Soon the red cherries appear in profusion. O my beautiful tree, how lavish you are and what a number of baskets you will fill!