CHAPTER XVII 



WATER-STRIDERS 



THE first week of March found the banks of Brook- 

 camp Run free from the snow and ice that had 

 fringed the stream the winter long. Still the flanks of 

 the South-valley Hills northward of Devon were streak- 

 ed with snow, and the drifts in some sheltered nooks 

 were unmelted. But we knew the winter had gone; 

 for, walking by the brook that winds through our grove, 

 we saw the water-striders skating over the surface. 

 The robins, meadow larks, and bluebirds had already 

 given notice of spring. But when these little fellows, 

 among the first of the insect horde to appear, had come 

 out upon their summer campaign, we were sure that we 

 had said good-bye to winter, albeit Jack Frost might pay 

 us a few visits more. 



And what are these prophets of the spring, the water- 

 striders? One might answer (and truly), "They are 

 bugs!" But that, perhaps, would not be quite definite 

 to many Americans, who have the odd habit of calling 

 all insects "bugs," and insect-lovers by the inelegant 

 title of "bug-hunters." Moreover, the name might 

 handicap our brothers of the brook at the outset of our 

 story, for to many minds it has an ill savor. Let us 

 say, then, that they belong to the family Hydrometridae 

 of the great order of Hemiptera (or true bugs), insects 



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