x 



58 LAYING ITS EGGS. 



which, if you copy faithfully on wood, will greatly add to 

 the interest of this history. The fly is magnified, hut 

 the cross below it shows the natural size. The life of the 

 fly is but another example of implicit obedience to Nature's 

 universal law, the heaven-descended command, " increase 

 and multiply." 



Very shortly after the due celebration of the nuptials, 

 the female repairs to the under side of a leaf, and standing 

 directly over its midrib, her back downwards, her wings 

 closely folded, and her antennae stretched straight out and 

 continually shivering, she bends her saw under her, so as 

 to give her body a curve, and deposits her first egg on the 

 rib itself; then a second, a third, and so on to the tip of 

 the leaf, or as near the tip as she can find convenient 

 standing-room. She then goes to one of the side ribs, then 

 to another, and so on, till all the principal ribs are garri- 

 soned with her eggs ranged in the prettiest rows ; the eggs 

 are very long, and are placed lengthwise, end to end, like 

 oblong beads on a string, yet not touching, for there is 

 generally a space of about half an egg's length between 

 each two. The eggs are very soft, and of a half-transpa- 

 rent white colour. After the first day the eggs begin to 

 grow, and before the end of a week they have grown to 

 three times their original size : the head of the egg is 

 always towards the tip of the leaf, and is remarkable for 

 having two black eyes, placed very far apart, and quite 

 on the sides, indeed so far asunder are these eyes, that, 

 like the behind buttons on the coat of a certain illustrious 

 coachman, immortalized by Dickens, it is very difficult to 

 bring both into the same field of view. 



It is seldom more than a week before the grub makes his 

 exit from the egg and his entrance into active life, but the 



