Pond Life 
soon, however, they fill out and become 
hard and stiff, transparent like gauze, 
and divided by lines of fine net-work. 
Its long body is covered with a shiny 
mail of bright colours, blue, yellow, or 
brown—for there are many different 
kinds of dragon-flies—and finally it 
darts off to fly about in the sunshine, 
still feeding on flies and flying insects in 
the same ravenous fashion as it did 
before. But it is now a much more 
beautiful creature than when it devoured 
its fellow grubs below the water. 
The beetle larva changes in due time 
to a large beetle, which lives part of its 
life in the water ; but it has also a large 
pair of wings carefully folded up under 
its wing-cases, with which it is able to 
fly about at night, and go from one 
pond to another. 
138 
