NATURE'S CRAFTSMEN 



seems to be a pleasant one as life goes among insects. 

 At least so it appears to the Imman onlooker, who can 

 only guess at the delights and the tribulations of these 

 lowly fellow-creatures who share with him the joys and 

 sorrows of the world of material nature. 



As one walks along the brook-side he notes that the 

 ■ water-striders have a fancy to keep in groups, as though 

 fond of society, and perhaps each group having its 

 favorite haunts. One wonders if they have developed 

 the sense and love of locality, a sort of home feeling 

 for one spot rather than for another. They come upon 

 the scene in groups, and there are several broods during 

 the year. 



They appear suddenly. One morning this or that 

 bit of surface will be dotted with a new fleet, dimpling 

 the surface-film as they scoot here and there. It is a 

 freshly hatched brood. Born amid the grasses on the 

 edge of the run, here they will spend their seemingly 

 merry days. Most insects, like Father Adam, come or 

 seem to come at a bound into the adult state. After 

 transformation they do not grow. Flies, butterflies, 

 moths, ants, wasps, beetles, dragon flies have an im- 

 mense and mysterious interval between their youth as 

 larvse, pupse, chrysalids, and their winged imagohood. 

 But not so with our Hydrometrids. They belong to 

 the insect orders that undergo incomplete transforma- 

 tion. They have a distinct childhood as water-striders, 

 and grow therefrom as do higher animals. Thus we 

 can watch our new-come flotilla of youngsters as day 

 by day they increase in size without any decided change 

 in form. Here in the shady nooks, the smooth bays, 

 the jungles of grass, forget-me-nots, and water-cress, 

 the tossing riffles and the quiet harbors of Brookcamp 



266 



