5 h THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



had a fluffy appearance, his body looked sodden, and he behaved in 

 a fat and sensual manner. He took the grossest pleasure in warming 

 his ventral surface on the side of the jar toward the sun. He sipped 

 the sweets of life to excess, and had lost that activity a fly ought to 

 possess. Alas ! his career rendered him unfit to battle in the struggle 

 for existence. He became the spider's first meal. . . 



The second fly had but one wing. He was lean and ill-nurtured, 

 yet he had withal a chirpy and pleasing manner. He had neither the 

 pompous bearing of opulence nor the boisterous ways of rude health. 

 He was a sweet-tempered and amiable fly, and among the local muscse 

 undoubtedly occupied the same position that Tiny Tim did in his 

 family. I should have let him go, only that I feared that, if I did so, 

 I should also release the third fly, whom my soul loathed. Now, let 

 me tell you why that fly was objectionable. He was the only fly left 

 on the window-panes, and he walked over them with the arrogance of 

 a landlord. I sought to catch him, but each attempt was more futile 

 than the last. He dodged, he flew away from the window, he calmly 

 floated about the room, and I followed him, flapping with my pocket- 

 handkerchief till I visibly perspired. He was as cunning as the fox 

 of Ballybogue, who, you remember, used to take in the newspaper to 

 see where the meets were to be. My temper overcame me, and I 

 swore I would have that fly. 



After a hunt, which brought out all my worst characteristics, I 

 caught him, and deposited him in my vivarium, rejoicing to myself 

 that his death-agonies would be some compensation for my pains. As 

 soon as he got into the jar, Mr. Fly discovered that his poor little 

 brother in adversity had a raw place where his wing had been torn off, 

 and he would follow him from place to place to put his sucker on to 

 the sore. It was not the kindliness of the dogs of Lazarus which led 

 him to lick the wound. He saw that Tim did not like it, and, as he 

 was a nasty, bullying cad, he persisted in his obnoxious performances. 

 I left him disgusted. He was a beast ! 



In the course of an hour or so I returned. The sensual fly was in 

 the arms of the spider. The hunter, with his quarry in his clutch, was 

 on the piece of paper, and I could see him well. Four black bead-like 

 eyes, situated on the very summit of his head, gleamed at me with 

 ferocity. His mandibles were stretched to their utmost. The hooked 

 extremity of one was driven into the fly's eye, the other was fixed 

 somewhere about its throat. Between these a pair of jaws were work- 

 ing with a synchronous and scissors-like movement, and his upper and 

 lower lip (for such they were, I afterward learned) worked, as it were, 

 between whiles. As the jaws approached each other, the lips parted. 

 His palps, or leg-like antennae, waved slowly as the tail of an angry 

 cat ; and his very spinnerets, six in number, stood out turgid with 

 excitement. The fly was still, except for a quivering motion of one 

 of its legs. It was the tremor of death. 



