A WALK THROUGH AX ENGLISH LANE. 95 



having to be removed — which is done very adroitly and 



without pause. Will he eat a wasp ? Certainly he will ; 



and though I never tried him with a hornet, they being 



unchancy insects to hold while one hand is otherwise 



engaged, I have little doubt but that the hornet would 



,soon disappear into the same receptacle with the other 



sts. You may go oh catching insects for him as 



)ng as you like, and he will go on eating them, having 



[no apparent linut to capacity. I once gave a dragon- 



[fly thirty-seven large flies and four long-legged spiders, 



[and only ceased because I was tired of catching before 



rhe was tired of eating. 



Having admired him sufficiently, let him go. Off 

 le darts to a branch, sits down for a moment, shakes 

 lis wings, as if to assure himself that they are fit for 

 srvice, and then flashes ofi", as cruel and as voracious 

 [as if he had been fasting for a week. He does not 

 md all his time after this fashion, though he was 

 Iways a predacious creature. His first few years were 

 ^passed in the water, where he lurked under the banks, 

 tand chased the aquatic insects as fiercely as, when he 

 ^got his wings, he pursued the inhabitants of air. In 

 the only change in him is that he was first a 

 [crocodile and then a dragon. 



What beautiful butterflies, too, flit through our 

 [lane, varying with the time of day and the season of 

 [the year. There is the magnificent peacock butterfly, 

 [with its glorious * eyes ' upon the wings, like the spots 

 Ion a peacock's train • the atalanta, or scarlet admiral, 



H 2 



