WATER-STRIDERS. 29 
portions of the ocean, frequently hundreds of miles from land. - 
Here they feed on the juices of dead animals floating on the sur- 
face. The insect illustrated in Fig. 20 is very common upon 
the calmer portions of lakes. 
The insects stow themselves away under the banks of 
‘streams, in the mud beneath leaves or rubbish, or at the bottom 
of water under stones and roots of trees, when the autumn be- 
gins to get cold; from thence they reappear upon the surface 
Fic. 21.—Hygrotrechus remigis Say. Original. 
of the water as soon as the warm weather of spring returns. 
Soon after this the eggs are attached by a sort of glue to the 
leaves and stems of aquatic plants. They are whitish, translucent, 
long, cylindrical, more blunt at the end from which the young 
emerges, than at the somewhat tapering, but round, opposite 
extremity. If the weather continues to grow warmer, the eggs 
mature in about two weeks; then the larve push their way out, 
not, as in many other Heteroptera, by thrusting up the lid, but 
by bursting through a slit which opens a little down the side. 
