364 INSECT TRANSFORMATIONS. 



a troop of which may be occasionally seen gamboling 

 in a sunny nook, though the ground be covered with 

 snow. When the weather is warm and mild, how- 

 ever, the dancing Tipulidce prefer the decline of day ; 

 and we have remarked them keeping it up as long 

 as we could distinguish them between the eye and 

 the waning light of the Avestern horizon : how much 

 longer they continued to dance we cannot tell. 



It is a very singular fact connected with these gnat 

 dances, that the company always consists exclusively 

 of males. This any person who will take the trouble 

 may verify by enclosing a group of them in a butter- 

 fly-net. If this be not at hand, he may procure good 

 evidence by wetting the hand, and passing it quickly 

 amongst the thickest of the crowd ; when several will 

 be caught, and will uniformly exhibit the beautifully - 

 fringed or plumed antennae, which in the female are 

 without the hairs or the plumelets. What it may be, 

 besides the same delighted and buoyant spirit which 

 causes lambs to group together in their frolics, that 

 induces those tiny gnats to sport in this manner on 

 the wing, is, perhaps, inexplicable. 



Wordsworth's opinion, though adopted by Kirby 

 and Spence, is perhaps, as we shall presently endea- 

 vour to show, more poetical than correct. His words 

 are: — 



" Nor wanting here to entertain the thought, 

 Creatures that in communities exist. 

 Less, as might seem, for general guardianship, 

 Or through dependence upon mutual aid 

 Than by participation of delight, 

 And a strict love of fellowship combined. 

 What other spirit can it be that prompts 

 The gilded summer flies to mix and weave 

 Their sports together in the solar beam, 

 Or, in the gloom of twilight, hum their joy ?" 



The Excursion. 



The evening gamboling of rooks on the wing, when 



