THE WATER CABINET. 111 
harmless Hydrous piceus, the lively Notanecta, Gyrinus, 
and Nepa, are essential to the collection. 
Among the larva, those of the Caddis fly should be 
kept in abundance, on account of the amusement afforded 
by their strange habits and their remarkable metamor- 
phosis. Larva of the Dytiscus, known as the Water 
Tiger, of the Dragon fly, the gnat, the May fly, and of 
the two-winged fly, Stratiomys Chameleon, the pretty 
blood-worm, which is the larva of the Chironomus plu- 
mosus, a very pretty gnat, with feathered antenne ; and 
the telescope-tailed grubs of Helophilus pendulus, which, 
in its larva form, is one of the most curious examples in 
the cabinet, and, in its imago, is frequently mistaken for 
the honey-bee. 
The drag-net will also bring out many curious water- 
mites, than which there can be no more interesting sub- 
jects for the microscope, or prettier objects for ordinary 
observation. While writing this, I have before me several 
specimens of the beautiful mites, Hydrachna geographica 
and abstergens (Miiller), in a jar of Nitella; they are 
ever in action, treading the water as if it were air, with 
a kind of motion that cannot be termed swimming, but 
rather a walking or dancing, maintained with the greatest 
ease at any level, or at the bottom of the vessel. Another, 
and much more showy one, is the bright carmine-coloured 
mite Limnochares holosericea (Latreille), of which I find 
an abundance in a neighbouring brook. Its pretty, 
spidery motions, and vivid colouring, render a jar, con- 
taining a dozen specimens, very attractive to the eye of 
a student of nature. 
