142 NATUEAL HISTORY OF 



perform their cheerful cir clings in separate family 

 associations. If we interfere with their merriment 

 they seem greatly alarmed, disperse, or dive to the 

 bottom, when their fears shortly subside, as we soon 

 again see our little merry friends gamboling as be- 

 fore. This plain, tiny, gliding water-flea seems a 

 very unlikely creature to arrest our young atten- 

 tions ; but the boy with his angle has not often 

 much to engage his notice, and the social active 

 parties of this nimble swimmer, presenting them- 

 selves at these periods of vacancy, become insensibly 

 familiar to his sight, and by many of us are not ob- 

 served in after life without recalling former hours, 

 scenes of, perhaps, less anxious days ; for trifles like 

 these, by reason of some association, are often re- 

 membered, when things of greater moment pass off 

 and leave no trace uDon the mind."* 



CYCLOUS VITTATUS. 



PLATE IV. Fig. 5. 



This insect exemplifies an exotic group, very 

 closely related to the Gyrini, but offering so many 

 minute modifications of structure as to warrant their 

 separation into a distinct genus. The most obvious 

 difference is the want of an apparent scutellum in 

 Cyclous, the great size of the body, and the length 



* Journal of a Naturalist. 



