66 The Book of Bugs. 



as her eggs grow and hatch out. It hurts the person she 

 has come to stay with. She feels sorry for him, no 

 douht, but she has a duty to perform and she performs 

 it, let the consequences be what they may. It is sad to 

 reflect that the person often dies, but her duty is to her 

 family before everything. I call that a noble spirit, but I 

 am glad that I live a long way off from the creature thus 

 displaying it. 



I suppose fleas, like the rest of us, soon become inured 

 to scenes of suffering and come to the conclusion that in 

 this world folks have to look out for the themselves, if 

 they do not want to get left. It does seem a little heart- 

 less, though, that as soon as a cat dies all the fleas on her 

 should leave and hunt for new quarters. After having 

 been nourished and warmed by her you would think 

 common gratitude would prompt them to wait, at least 

 until after the funeral, before looking for another sit- 

 uation. But no, sir, they get right out. That just 

 shows you that ingratitude is not confined to the human 

 race. 



They have their little faults of temper, too. We have 

 not studied fleas much, but it has been observed that, if 

 two females are put into a glass tube together, instead of 

 laying eggs in a friendly way as they should, they rear 

 up on their hind legs and fight scandalously. 



These parasites are different from most in that they 

 do not become parasites until they have grown up, just 

 as the house-fly does not come into the house until it is 

 grown up. Little fleas are the gentlemen ; larger ones 

 the ladies. 



We are often invited to wonder at the extraordinary 

 strength of fleas as compared with that of human beings. 

 A flea can jump one foot high, which is one hundred times 

 his own height. If a man were correspondingly strong 



