NATURAL FLIES. 263 



NATURAL MAY-FLIES. 



Ephemera, vulgate May-fly, or Green-Drake. 

 This may-fly is bred from the cad-worm, and is 

 found in numbers beside most small gravelly rivers, 

 near the banks where bushes grow and overhang 

 the water, to which places they fly when they change 

 from their chrysalis state j its wings, which are single, 

 stand high on the back like the butterfly. The 

 i curious observer may be gratified daily, during fine 

 weather the latter end of May, by seeing this singular 

 insect break through the case of dried weed or straw 

 rushes, in which it has been incased while in the state 

 of a maggot, and, by the wonderful power of the 

 * Creator, become completely transformed into a fly. 

 The body of this fly is a yellow, (some are darker 

 than others,) ribbed across with green ; the tail 

 consists of three small wisks, quite dark, and turned 

 upwards to the back, like the tail of a drake or 

 mallard : from the green stripes on the body, and its 

 turned-up tail, this may- fly receives the name of 

 green-drake; in some places it is also called the 

 cock-up or tilt-up tail, as is also the grey drake. 



GREY-DRAKE. 



The grey-drake, in shape and size, is like the 

 green-drake, but different in colour, being a lighter 

 yellow, and striped with black down its body; the 

 wings are glossy black, and thin like a cob-web. 



