LIFE IN THE INSECT WORLD. 229 



Renet. I did not know that the wings of the 

 fly were colored. 



Jlunt M. Look at them, and see if they are 

 not. 



Rene&. Yes, they are beautifully colored. 

 There is violet and green, and a tinge of yel- 

 low. 



Harriet. How strange that we should never 

 have noticed it before. 



Aunt M. It is indeed strange that any of 

 their beauties should pass unobserved, when 

 they are so constantly around us. There, the 

 fly is gone but it is no matter ; we will *ake 

 the liberty of talking about him in his absence. 

 If you had examined the proboscis of the fly, 

 you would have found it as smooth and as 

 beautifully polished as the sting of the bee, 

 which I showed you some evenings since. 



You know the proboscis is hollow, and that 

 the fly takes its food through it ; it resorts to an 

 ingenious expedient when it meets with a grain 

 of sugar which is too large and hard to pass 

 through this slender tube. It lets a drop of 

 fluid fall upon it, or, in other words, spits upon 



20* 



