Once within reach of the enchantress, the grappling-hooks are thrown, the fangs strike, the double saws close together and hold the victim in a vice.

Vainly the captive struggles; his mandibles chew the air, his desperate kicks meet with no resistance.
He has met with his fate.

The Mantis refolds her wings, the standard of battle; she resumes her normal pose, and the meal commences.
In attacking the Truxalis and the Ephippigera, less dangerous game than the grey cricket and the Decticus, the spectral pose is less imposing and of shorter duration.

It is often enough to throw forward the talons; this is so in the case of the Epeirus, which is seized by the middle of the body, without a thought of its venomous claws.

With the smaller crickets, which are the customary diet in my cages as at liberty, the Mantis rarely employs her means of intimidation; she merely seizes the heedless passer-by as she lies in wait.
When the insect to be captured may present some serious resistance, the Mantis is thus equipped with a pose which terrifies or perplexes, fascinates or absorbs the prey, while it enables her talons to strike with greater certainty.